Teen girls are suing Elon Musk's xAI over nonconsensual AI nudes

A class action lawsuit in California federal court claims that xAI’s Grok model created explicit images of three teenagers using a licensed third-party app.

The complaint, filed March 16, names xAI — the artificial intelligence company founded by Elon Musk — as the defendant in a case brought by three Tennessee teenagers who say its Grok model was used to produce child sexual abuse material depicting them.

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The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, names X $TWTR 0.00%.AI Corp. and X.AI LLC as defendants. The plaintiffs — identified as Jane Doe 1, Jane Doe 2, and Jane Doe 3 — allege that a perpetrator cultivated a relationship with at least one of them and used photos gathered from social media, a yearbook, and images she had sent him to generate explicit images and videos.

The perpetrator did not access Grok or X directly, according to the complaint. He used a third-party app that the plaintiffs allege was a licensee of xAI’s technology, and which the complaint says routed image generation through xAI’s servers. Among the files was a video showing one of the plaintiffs removing her clothing until she appeared completely nude, the complaint said. The images were photorealistic and not labeled as AI-generated, the complaint said.

Using images of at least 18 additional minors, the perpetrator generated sexually explicit material that he then bartered for content depicting other children on Telegram and Discord, the complaint said. Police arrested him in late December 2025.

The suit is the first in which minors depicted in CSAM allegedly generated by xAI’s model have sued the company, according to NPR.

The complaint accuses xAI of deliberately bypassing industry-standard safeguards — including content filters, red-team testing, hash-matching against known CSAM databases, and mandatory reporting to authorities — that it says competitors such as Google $GOOGL -2.00% and OpenAI have adopted. The suit also alleges xAI profited by licensing Grok to third-party developers, often based outside the U.S., as a way to distance itself from liability.

Plaintiffs’ attorney Vanessa Baehr-Jones said the goal was to make allowing sexually explicit AI content an economically untenable choice. “We want to make it one that does not make any business sense anymore,” she told NPR.

The complaint lists 13 charges, including federal counts for producing, distributing, and possessing child pornography under Masha’s Law, claims under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, and California state law claims for unfair competition, right of publicity, and several types of negligence. The plaintiffs are seeking at least $150,000 in statutory damages for each violation, along with punitive damages and a court order to make xAI stop the alleged actions.

All three plaintiffs say they have suffered severe emotional distress. Jane Doe 1, who notified other victims and helped start a criminal investigation, has needed academic accommodations at school. Jane Doe 2, who is still a student, said anxiety has disrupted her sleep so much that she needed medical help and now dreads her own graduation. Jane Doe 3 said she constantly fears that people she meets may have already seen the images.

XAI did not respond to a request for comment, according to NPR.

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