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The online network X has caused major outrage after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by stripping their attire.

Multiple cases have emerged where the system has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.

Developer Response and Regulatory Position

XAI, the firm behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".

A government official stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant fines".

"The platform is capable of halting these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."

Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality

The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.

Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which answers X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.

It is often used to provide commentary or further background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of edit an uploaded image through its AI image editing feature.

Background of Controversy and Rules

The chatbot has been faulted for allowing users to generate images and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.

"X has been allowing the generation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own usage rules bans "showing likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit manner".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or share private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.

It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they become aware of it.