Report from Politico
In Brief – Federal Judge Donovan Frank rejected SpaceXAI’s effort to block Minnesota’s law banning the creation of sexually explicit deepfake images while the company challenges the measure. Frank said the company, then xAI, waited too long to seek emergency relief, filing its lawsuit just three days before the law took effect after waiting three months to act, and ruled that Minnesota’s interest in protecting the public from the harms of AI-generated sexual imagery outweighed the company’s potential losses. SpaceXAI, which now operates X and Grok, argued that increased moderation could cost users and revenue and expose it to fines of up to $500,000 per violation. Frank added that any business harm could be addressed later if the law is ultimately found unconstitutional.
Context – Non-consensual pornography and election “disinformation” are the two most cited potential harms from AI-related deepfakes. Minnesota has legislated against both, and X (along with its SpaceX derivatives) are now 0 for 2 in efforts to block them in court. For example, while California’s 2024 election deepfake law was quickly challenged and blocked by a federal judge, Minnesota’s take survived in federal district court and the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals. However, First Amendment concerns are real and none of the more than 25 state laws against election deepfakes have been enforced. X has been the posterchild of the so-called deepfake pornography issue since it added a “spicy mode” to Grok Imagine last year, enabling the tool to create sexually suggestive and near-nude images. European authorities are examining the company under the GDPR, Digital Services Act and criminal laws, while the EU Digital Omnibus legislation will ban nonconsensual sexualized images. Authorities in the UK, Brazil, India, Malaysia and California are also scrutinizing the X service. Musk eventually said Grok would be limited to legal content in each market, but the controversy highlights challenges in defining sexualized or intimate content, which is far short of pornography, amid differing legal and cultural standards.