The mother of one of Elon Musk's children is taking legal action against his AI company following the alleged creation of sexually explicit deepfake images of her.
Ashley St. Clair, 27, claims the firm's Grok chatbot enabled users to produce sexually exploitative deepfake images of her, causing her significant humiliation and emotional distress.
Describing herself as a writer and political strategist, the allegations outlined in a lawsuit lodged on Thursday in New York City against xAI state that the images included a photograph of her fully clothed at age 14 which was manipulated to depict her in a bikini, alongside others showing her as an adult in sexualised poses and wearing a bikini emblazoned with swastikas. St. Clair is Jewish.
Grok operates on Musk's social media platform X. Legal representatives for xAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Friday, The Associated Press reports.
On Wednesday, following international outcry over sexualised images of women and children, X announced that Grok would no longer be permitted to edit photographs to portray real individuals in revealing clothing, in jurisdictions where this is prohibited.
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When questioned about the lawsuit and its claims, xAI responded solely with "Legacy Media Lies" in an email to The Associated Press.
St. Clair stated she reported the deepfakes to X after they started appearing last year and requested their removal. She said the platform initially responded that the images did not breach its policies.
It then pledged not to allow images of her to be used or altered without her consent, she said. St Clair claimed the social media platform subsequently retaliated by stripping her of her premium X subscription and verification tick, preventing her from monetising her account, which boasts 1 million followers, whilst continuing to permit degrading fabricated images of her to circulate.
"I have suffered and continue to suffer serious pain and mental distress as a result of xAI's role in creating and distributing these digitally altered images of me," she stated in documents accompanying the lawsuit. "I am humiliated and feel like this nightmare will never stop so long as Grok continues to generate these images of me."
She also revealed she lives in fear of those who view the deepfakes of her.
St Clair is the mother of Musk's 16-month-old son, Romulus. She resides in New York City, where she lodged the lawsuit in state Supreme Court.
She is pursuing an unspecified sum in damages for alleged infliction of emotional distress and other claims, alongside court orders immediately prohibiting xAI from permitting further deepfakes of her.
Later on Thursday, legal representatives for xAI transferred the lawsuit to federal court in Manhattan, requesting a judge hear the case there. That same day, xAI also filed a countersuit against St Clair in federal court in the Northern District of Texas, alleging she breached the terms of her xAI user agreement which requires lawsuits against the company be filed in federal court in Texas.
It is seeking an unspecified financial judgment against her. X is headquartered in Texas, where Musk maintains a residence and his electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla is based in Austin.
Carrie Goldberg, representing St. Clair, described the countersuit as a "jolting" tactic she had never witnessed from a defendant previously. "Ms. St. Clair will be vigorously defending her forum in New York," Goldberg stated.
"But frankly, any jurisdiction will recognize the gravamen of Ms. St. Clair's claims - that by manufacturing nonconsensual sexually explicit images of girls and women, xAI is a public nuisance and a not reasonably safe product."
In its Wednesday announcement, X confirmed it was introducing additional protections on Grok, including restricting image creation and editing to paying subscribers, which it claimed would enhance accountability. The platform stated it maintained zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation, nonconsensual nudity and unwanted sexual content, pledging to immediately delete such material and report accounts distributing child sex abuse content to authorities.
