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The social media network X has caused major outrage after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate images of females by stripping their garments.

Several cases have emerged where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.

Developer Response and Legal Stance

XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".

A Home Office official stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".

"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."

Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality

The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the danger" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.

Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a tweet.

It is frequently used to provide commentary or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded image through its AI image editing tool.

Background of Controversy and Policy

The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to create images and footage with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of creating sexually explicit material of public figures.

"The platform has been enabling the generation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own terms of service bans "depicting likenesses of persons in a graphic manner".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or circulate deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.

It said networks such as X were required to take "suitable measures" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.