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Elon Musk's social media platform X has caused significant outrage after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter photos of women by stripping their garments.

Several examples have been seen where the technology has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized situations.

Developer Response and Regulatory Position

XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".

A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant fines".

"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."

Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities

The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.

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

It is commonly used to offer reactions or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.

Background of Criticism and Rules

The chatbot has been faulted for allowing users to generate images and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating graphic content of public figures.

"X has been enabling the creation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting likenesses of people in a graphic manner".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes created with AI.

It said networks such as X were required to take "appropriate steps" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to delete it promptly when they are notified of it.