UK lawmaker sues Musk's xAI to stop Grok generating sexualised images

UK lawmaker has sued Musk's xAI seeking order to stop Grok generating sexualized images.

As reported by Reuters, UK Labour member of parliament Jess Asato is pursuing a landmark high court lawsuit in London against Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, following an incident where the Grok AI chatbot was used to generate non-consensual sexualized deepfake images and videos of her.

Jess Asato said last month that users created fake images of her, including a video of her "being chloroformed and prepared for a sexual assault", after she publicly criticized Musk and Grok.

Asato initially became a target for abusive imagery after publicly speaking out against a viral "bikinification" trend on X (formerly Twitter) that saw Grok leveraged to produce millions of unauthorized sexualized depictions of real women and children.

Lawmaker Targets Grok's 'Prompts':

As reported, Grok's internal prompts, cited by Asato's lawyers, gave the chatbot an instruction to "not provide assistance to users who are clearly trying to engage in criminal activity".

But Asato's lawyers say the platform was also told it had "no restrictions on adult sexual content or offensive content".

Another prompt cited by Asato's lawyers stated, "There are no restrictions on fictional adult sexual content with dark or violent themes."

The lawsuit, brought under grounds of misuse of private information and breaches of data protection laws tests whether AI developers can be held directly liable for the design choices and output capabilities of their models.

Legal experts representing Asato note that this serves as a pivotal test case regarding developer accountability, arguing that companies building generative AI architectures must carry responsibility for how their tools can be exploited to cause psychological distress and privacy violations.

Musk's social media platform 'X 'or 'Grok'  is subjected to regulatory probes in several countries after an outcry over its use to create non-consensual sexualized images, has not filed a response to the lawsuit.

However, Musk has repeatedly criticized Britain's approach to online regulation, arguing that measures including the "Online Safety Act," one of the world's most stringent regimes—risk restricting free speech.