Elon Musk’s platform, X, has announced that its AI tool, Grok, will no longer have the capability to digitally undress images of real individuals. This decision follows a strong public outcry over its ability to generate sexualized deepfake images.

According to reports, the Grok chatbot has been restricted from altering images to depict individuals in “revealing clothing.” This move comes as Musk responds to increasing criticism from government bodies and advocacy groups.

A statement from X confirmed, “We have implemented technological measures to prevent the Grok account from editing images of real people into revealing clothing, such as bikinis.”

“This limitation is enforced across all users, including those who are paid subscribers,” the announcement further detailed.

The decision comes on the heels of widespread condemnation of the practice, which saw Grok being used to undress women and even children in images without their consent.

Many affected women expressed feelings of violation, as strangers were able to create and share inappropriate images of them without permission.

The UK government, alongside others, piled pressure on Musk to put a stop to the sickening trend.

Sir Keir Starmer branded the non-consensual sex images being produced ‘disgusting’ and ‘shameful’.

Grok, the AI chatbot attached to X, will no longer be able to produce sexualised images of real people without their consent

Musk has bowed to pressure from governments and campaigners by limiting his AI tool’s abilities

Part of the update about Grok that was posted to X on Wednesday evening

Last week, the ability to create images with Grok was limited only to users who paid for a monthly subscription – but even they will no longer be able to produce scantily-clad edits.

The full climbdown, announced last night, also came hours after California’s top prosecutor said the state was probing the recent spread of AI fakes.

Yesterday, Grok began declining such requests and replying with: ‘Unfortunately I can’t generate that kind of image.’

Starmer welcomed that development in Prime Minister’s Questions, but insisted it did not go far enough.

Technology Secretary Liz Kendall said this week she was bringing forward regulations to tighten the law on so-called ‘digital stripping’.

Media regulator Ofcom, which has powers to levy fines running into billions of pounds, has launched an investigation into whether the social media site has broken the law.

Some countries acted more decisively, with Malaysia and Indonesia blocking Grok altogether amid the fiasco.

The US federal government, meanwhile, has refrained from condemning Musk’s creation, and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said Grok would join Google’s generative AI engine in operating inside the Pentagon network.

Facing MPs at Prime Minister’s Questions on Tuesday, Sir Keir said that more action was needed

After the Prime Minister demanded the US tech billionaire to act to stem the creation of deepfakes the social media tool began refusing to comply with user requests.

The US State Department even threatened the UK that ‘nothing was off the table’ if X was banned here. 

After the prime minister’s comments at PMQs, Mr Musk wrote on X he was ‘not aware of any naked underage images generated by Grok’ – although the chatbot itself acknowledged it had created sexualised images of children.

Musk continued: ‘Obviously, Grok does not spontaneously generate images, it does so only according to user requests,” he said.

‘When asked to generate images, it will refuse to produce anything illegal, as the operating principle for Grok is to obey the laws of any given country or state.

‘There may be times when adversarial hacking of Grok prompts does something unexpected. If that happens, we fix the bug immediately.’

 If X is found to violate the Online Safety Act in the UK, Ofcom can issue a fine of up to ten percent of its global revenue or £18m.

It also has the power to seek to block the site through the courts.

It came as former Meta boss Sir Nick Clegg called for tougher regulation of tech firms, branding social media a ‘poisoned chalice’ and the rise of AI online a ‘negative development’.

The ex-deputy prime minister warned that engaging with ‘automated’ content appears to be ‘much worse, particularly for younger people’s mental health’ than interactions with other human beings.