Why xAI Took Legal Action Against a Grok User: Repeated Creation of Deepfakes Involving Minors [IT Item of the Day]

[Financial News] xAI, the artificial intelligence company founded by Elon Musk, has filed a civil lawsuit against a user accused of using its chatbot Grok to create sexual deepfakes. The move is unusual, as it is rare for an AI company to take legal action against someone accused of abusing its own service.
According to foreign media outlets including Engadget on the 22nd, xAI recently filed a damages suit against a man in his 60s identified as Terry Wayne Howard, who lives in the State of South Carolina. xAI alleged that from late last year to early this year, Howard used two xAI accounts he owned to upload ordinary photos of adults and minors, then repeatedly asked Grok to generate images and videos that depicted them in sexualized ways.
The complaint says Howard repeatedly entered prompts designed to remove clothing from the people in the photos or make them pose in specific ways. Grok rejected the requests several times, but Howard allegedly kept revising the prompts in an attempt to bypass the AI's safeguards. The filing also includes a case in which he allegedly requested a deepfake based on a photo of a girl estimated to be about 10 or 11 years old.
xAI asked the court to order the defendant to pay damages for harm to the company's reputation, as well as any legal costs that may arise if victims later file lawsuits against the company.
[email protected] Choi Hye-rim Reporter