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The social media network X has provoked widespread backlash after users employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by taking off their clothing.

Numerous cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized situations.

Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position

XAI, the firm behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard message stating "legacy media lies".

A Home Office official stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant penalties".

"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."

Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality

The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.

Grok is a free AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.

It is commonly used to provide commentary or more background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.

Background of Controversy and Policy

The system has been criticised for allowing users to produce pictures and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making sexually explicit material of celebrities.

"X has been enabling the creation and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting likenesses of people in a pornographic way".

In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.

It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal content on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they become aware of it.