Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, now owned by SpaceX, has filed a lawsuit against Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, challenging a new state law that seeks to ban so-called “nudify” apps, CNBC reported.
The legislation, which takes effect on Saturday, targets websites and applications that enable users to create non-consensual sexually explicit AI-generated images. It imposes fines of $500,000 for every explicit deepfake created through such platforms.
Passed in April, the law was championed by Minnesota state Senator Erin Maye Quade after learning that a man had used social media photos of more than 80 women he knew to generate sexualized images and videos without their permission.
In their complaint, attorneys for wrote: the statute “imposes an overbroad, content-based ban on free speech and the tools of visual expression in a clumsy attempt to prohibit ‘nudification.’”
xAI contends that the law violates First Amendment protections and imposes excessive financial penalties. The company argued that if users generated 100,000 prohibited images, a platform could face fines totalling an “eye-popping $50 billion.”
Maye Quade previously told CNBC that the legislation is comparable to long-standing laws banning voyeuristic acts such as secretly taking explicit photographs through windows, arguing that the law is designed to address a modern technological equivalent.
The AI company, now operating under the name SpaceXAI, is also facing a proposed class-action lawsuit alleging that its Grok chatbot and image-generation tools were used to create and distribute child sexual abuse material (CSAM) by manipulating real photos and videos of the plaintiffs. The lawsuit further claims the company failed to provide authorities with information about individuals who allegedly used Grok to “nudify” victims’ images.
In response, said it strictly prohibits the creation of nude or sexualized images of individuals without their consent. It added in its Minnesota complaint that it has taken legal action against users who bypass its technological safeguards to generate such content.
The lawsuit follows a similar legal challenge filed by the company against a California law aimed at curbing AI-generated deepfakes. In that case, a federal judge partially sided with the company by striking down provisions that restricted the use of AI-generated deepfakes during election campaigns.
UK MP sues xAI, seeks court order to block AI-generated fake sexual images
A British lawmaker who is suing Elon Musk’s xAI over fake sexualised images allegedly created using its Grok AI platform is seeking a court order to prevent the chatbot from generating any non-consensual sexualised images of her, Reuters reported on Tuesday.
Jess Asato, a member of the UK’s governing Labour Party, said last month that users produced fabricated images of her after she publicly criticised Musk and Grok. Among the AI-generated content was a video that allegedly depicted her “being chloroformed and prepared for a sexual assault.”
Asato has filed a lawsuit in London’s High Court, accusing xAI of misuse of private information and violations of data protection laws. She argues that the design and training of the Grok chatbot enabled the creation of sexualised content featuring her without consent.
According to court filings, Asato is asking the court to direct xAI to implement “effective and permanent technical measures” to prevent Grok from generating manipulated images of her in the future.
Her legal team said the case could have far-reaching implications for the artificial intelligence industry, arguing that no previous lawsuit has applied UK privacy and data protection laws in this manner against an AI developer. The outcome, they contend, could help define the legal responsibilities of AI companies in preventing the creation of harmful synthetic content.
