California sends cease-and-desist letter to Musk’s xAI over sexualized deepfake images

By Gizem Nisa Demir

ISTANBUL (AA) - California Attorney General Rob Bonta on Friday sent a cease-and-desist letter to Elon Musk–owned xAI, demanding an immediate halt to AI-generated sexualized deepfakes of girls and women linked to the Grok model on the US social media company X.

In a statement released by the California Department of Justice, Bonta said the “creation, distribution, publication and exhibition” of deepfakes of girls constitutes child sexual abuse material and violates California law, and that his office is investigating nonconsensual, sexually explicit content produced using Grok.

“The avalanche of reports detailing this material — at times depicting women and children engaged in sexual activity — is shocking and… potentially illegal,” he said, stressing that “California has zero tolerance for child sexual abuse material.”

State officials cited reports that Grok altered images to “undress” subjects without consent, sometimes involving minors.

xAI did not immediately respond. Musk said he was “not aware of any naked underage images generated by Grok. Literally zero.”

X said it is blocking certain image edits and vowed “zero tolerance for any forms of child sexual exploitation.”