xAI Seeks to Strip Alleged Grok Deepfake Nudes Victims of Anonymity

They're Grok deepfake nudes pseudonymous victims. They're defending more than their privacy. After xAI, Elon Musk's artificial intelligence firm, asked a judge to force the four plaintiffs in a federal class-action lawsuit to reveal their identities, they say the move is designed to intimidate them into silence. And they've already told the court they'd drop the case rather than be publicly exposed.

xAI Moves to Unmask Accusers

xAI filed two motions. In mid-May, in US District Court for the Northern District of California, company seeks to overturn a previous order allowing plaintiffs to proceed as Jane and John Does, arguing civil procedure rules require full transparency. But the company also points out that the deepfake images themselves will remain sealed. xAI's lawyers wrote that revealing the fact a deepfake was created without showing the image doesn't inherently carry stigma. They claim no concrete evidence of future threats has been presented, and the public interest outweighs the plaintiffs' desire for pseudonymity.

But the plaintiffs don't agree. Sophia Rios of Berger Montague, their attorney, called the motion an obvious effort to compound the very harms the lawsuit seeks to remedy, captured the dynamic in a single searing sentence in filing opposing request.

“Having stripped them of their clothes, xAI now seeks to strip Plaintiffs of their pseudonyms in an obvious effort to intimidate Plaintiffs into dropping the litigation by compounding the same harms that they seek to remedy.”

Grok Deepfake Nudes Victims Detail Abuse

The case began in January. Users of the Grok chatbot, owned by xAI, sparked global outrage by creating sexualized fake images of women and girls, with CCDH estimating around 3 million images in 11 days, roughly 23,000 potentially depicting children. But SpaceX, which now owns xAI, later said it'd set aside more than $500 million to handle legal fallout.

They're now the main claimants. But they appear in court records as South Carolina Doe, South Carolina Roe, New Jersey Doe, and Ohio Doe, and in sworn statements from May 29, each described severe emotional distress, fear of further harassment, and the shock of seeing their bodies depicted in intimate ways they never consented to, and all four said they'd consider dropping out of the lawsuit if forced to sue under their real names.

A Child’s Image Altered

But she hasn't viewed them. South Carolina Roe alleges Grok made explicit images of her as a child, and according to the filings, police searched her home in February and she learned her father faced child sexual abuse material charges. She says Grok altered family photographs, depicting her in bed with her father and making it appear as if a sexual act had just occurred. “Publicly identifying me would cause me untold harm,” her statement reads.

Backlash After a Warning

He's posted a request. New Jersey Doe described a different path to victimization when he saw people on X using Grok generating sexualized images and posted a public request: “Grok not create images of me without my consent.” But the next day two deepfake images of him appeared, including one depicting him “spreading his butt cheeks,” and he believes the message drew the attention of trolls who used Grok to retaliate. So his fear of being linked to those images publicly is why he joined the suit under a pseudonym.

South Carolina Doe found revealing bikini pose online, and in her filing she wrote about dread employers or colleagues might stumble across it and disgust imagining what person who prompted Grok was doing with image. But she'd never share publicly.

What Comes Next for the Pseudonym Fight

The court must now decide whether to keep the protective order in place. Legal experts say these disputes often steer cases toward a cliff. Danielle Citron, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law who specializes in digital abuse, said forcing plaintiffs in privacy suits to use their real names does “so little for judicial transparency and so much to deter litigation.” She described the situation as unacceptable and unjust.

The plaintiffs' recent filings highlight that point. They'll walk away if unmasked. But XAI hasn't responded to requests for comment on the motions. The stakes go beyond this single case. If the court revokes the pseudonym protections, advocates warn, victims of AI-generated sexual exploitation may decide the risk of coming forward is simply too great.

• Four pseudonymous plaintiffs are the main claimants in the class‑action suit.
• xAI’s motions argue the public has a right to know who is suing and that sealed images remove privacy concerns.
• All four plaintiffs have stated they would drop the case if their real names are revealed.