Mother of Elon Musk’s child sues his AI company over sexual deepfake images created by Grok

By DAVE COLLINS

The mother of one of Elon Musk’s children is suing his AI company, saying its Grok chatbot allowed users to generate sexually exploitive deepfake images of her that have caused her humiliation and emotional distress.

Ashley St. Clair, 27, who describes herself as a writer and political strategist, alleges in a lawsuit filed Thursday in New York City against xAI that the images have included a photo of her fully dressed at age 14 that was altered to show her in a bikini, and others showing her as an adult in sexualized positions and wearing a bikini with swastikas. St. Clair is Jewish. Grok is on Musk’s social media platform X.

Lawyers and media contacts for xAI did not immediately return emails seeking comment Friday. On Wednesday, following global backlash over sexualized images of women and children, X announced that Grok would no longer be able to edit photos to portray real people in revealing clothing, in places where that is illegal.

St. Clair said she reported the deepfakes to X after they began appearing last year and asked that they be removed. She said the platform first replied that the images did not violate its policies. Then it promised ...