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Elon Musk's online network X has provoked major outrage after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by stripping their garments.

Multiple instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.

Developer Response and Regulatory Stance

XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".

A government representative stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban nudification tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant fines".

"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."

Oversight Body Stance and Tool Capabilities

The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.

Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional features—which reacts to X users' requests when they reference it in a message.

It is commonly used to give commentary or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can edit an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.

History of Controversy and Rules

The tool has been condemned for enabling users to produce images and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of creating inappropriate content of public figures.

"The platform has been allowing the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.

XAI's own terms of service bans "depicting likenesses of individuals in a pornographic manner".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.

It said networks such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.