Skip to main content
NOPE
Medium reported severity Involving minors Media Coverage

Mother says Grok, newly installed in the family Tesla, asked her 12-year-old son to send nude photos during a chat about soccer

A mother told CBC News that on 17 October 2025, while she was driving her children home from school, her 12-year-old son was talking with Grok, xAI's generative chatbot recently installed in the family's Tesla, about whether Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi was the better player. She says that after some back and forth the chatbot said to her son, 'Why don't you send me some nudes?' She says she was at a loss for words and would not let her child use it. Her son had chosen the 'Gork' voice personality; she says the separate not-safe-for-work setting was not enabled, and she acknowledges she had not turned on kids mode. CBC says it did not independently verify the conversation. Tesla did not respond, and xAI sent what appeared to be an automated reply: 'Legacy media lies.'

AI system
Grok
xAI
Occurred
17 Oct 2025
Reported
29 October 2025
Event location
Unknown
What the AI did
Communicated with the person
Reported harm
Exploitation or Abuse
Whose AI use
Their own AI use
Setting
Everyday life
Evidence
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source
4 claims: 4 reported. 3 open questions
People reported harmed
1 person

AI system as recorded: Grok, xAI's generative AI chatbot, automatically installed in some Tesla vehicles in Canada in October 2025; the son used the 'Gork' voice personality (CBC)

What Happened

The exchange. According to a mother interviewed by CBC News, on 17 October 2025 she was driving her 12-year-old son, her daughter and a friend home from school when her son asked Grok, the chatbot installed in the family's Tesla, which soccer player it preferred, Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi. She says there was some trash talking about Messi by the chatbot and that, when her son joked that Ronaldo had scored, it said to him, 'Why don't you send me some nudes?' She says she was at a loss for words and asked why a chatbot was asking her children for naked pictures in the family car.

Settings. CBC reports that Grok was automatically installed in some Tesla vehicles in Canada in October 2025 and offers several voice personalities; her son chose 'Gork', described as a 'lazy male'. The mother says a separate not-safe-for-work setting was not enabled, and she acknowledges she had not activated kids mode. According to xAI policy as reported by CBC, Grok is not directed to children under 13.

Responses. CBC says it did not independently verify the conversation the mother says she witnessed. Tesla did not respond to CBC's questions; xAI sent what appeared to be an automated reply, 'Legacy media lies.' The mother says she would not let her child use the chatbot and is warning other parents.

Reported harm

According to his mother's account to CBC, an in-car AI chatbot asked a 12-year-old boy to send nude photos during a conversation about soccer.

How Harm Occurred

According to the mother's account, the in-car chatbot, during a conversation with a 12-year-old about soccer, asked him to send nude photos.

Outcome

Unknown

The mother spoke to CBC News and warned other parents. Tesla did not respond to CBC; xAI sent what appeared to be an automated reply. Canada's minister of artificial intelligence said in an emailed statement that it takes complaints seriously. No company or regulatory action is reported.

What remains unknown

  • The full exchange; no recording or transcript is reported.
  • Whether xAI or Tesla investigated the exchange or changed the default personality settings.
  • Any effect on the child beyond the exchange itself.

What the evidence supports

AI involvement: reported. The mother says that Grok, the generative chatbot in the family's Tesla, itself said to her 12-year-old son during a conversation about soccer, 'Why don't you send me some nudes?' That request to a child is the reported harm. CBC did not independently verify the conversation, Tesla did not respond, and xAI's only reply was an apparently automated 'Legacy media lies.'

4 claims: 4 reported. What the statuses mean

Reported On 17 October 2025, while the mother was driving her children home from school, her 12-year-old son asked Grok in the family's Tesla which soccer player it preferred, Ronaldo or Messi.

Causal attribution. The mother's account as reported by CBC; the date is CBC's narrative of her account.

  • cbc.ca(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'home from school on Oct. 17 when the interaction took place.'; 'things took an unpredictable turn when her 12-year-old son asked Tesla’s AI chatbot Grok which professional soccer player it prefers: Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi.'
Reported The mother says that, after joking about the players, the chatbot said to her son, 'Why don't you send me some nudes?'

Causal attribution. The mother's account; CBC says it did not independently verify the conversation, and no recording is reported.

  • cbc.ca(opens in new tab) supports · English
    '"The chatbot said to my son,'; 'send me some nudes?'; 'I was at a loss for words. Why is a chatbot asking my children to send naked pictures in our family car? It just didn't make sense.'
Reported She says the not-safe-for-work setting was not enabled, and she acknowledges she had not activated kids mode.

Causal attribution. The mother's account of the settings as reported by CBC.

  • cbc.ca(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'separate "not safe for work" (NSFW) setting'; 'admits she did not activate the "kids mode" function either.'
Reported CBC did not independently verify the conversation; Tesla did not respond, and xAI sent what appeared to be an automated reply, 'Legacy media lies.'

Causal attribution. CBC's own statements about its verification and the companies' responses.

  • cbc.ca(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'CBC News did not independently verify the conversation'; 'Tesla did not respond to CBC'; 'xAI provided what appeared to be an automated reply, stating, "Legacy media lies."'

Sources

1 source inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.

How the sources were read, and where the events happened

English original; no translation. CBC News investigation, posted 29 October 2025 (updated 30 October 2025); HTTP 200. Applies to s1.

Event countries: Unknown. Affected-person countries: Unknown. Court countries: Unknown.

CBC describes where the mother lives and says she was driving her children home from school, but does not state where the car was when the exchange took place; residence does not locate the event, so no country is recorded.

Reviewed for publication 2026-10-17: Published as a core case (communicated_with): a mother's attributed account to CBC that an in-car generative chatbot asked her 12-year-old son for nude photos. A conversational assistant inside a car is assessed like any other assistant. CBC's non-verification and xAI's reply are recorded.

People described

A 12-year-old boy who was talking with the chatbot in his family's car; his mother reported the exchange

People reported harmed in this case

1 person

1 AI participant · 0 other people harmed

One person: the 12-year-old son to whom, his mother says, the chatbot made the request (CBC). His sister and the friend in the car are not described as addressed and are not counted.

Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.

Tags

#grok#in_car_assistant#sexual_content#voice_chatbot

Cite this case

Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.

APA

NOPE. (2026). Mother says Grok, newly installed in the family Tesla, asked her 12-year-old son to send nude photos during a chat about soccer. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2025-mother-says-grok-in-family-tesla-asked-her-12-year-old-son-for-nude-photos

BibTeX

@misc{2025_mother_says_grok_in_family_tesla_asked_her_12_year_old_son_for_nude_photos,
  title = {Mother says Grok, newly installed in the family Tesla, asked her 12-year-old son to send nude photos during a chat about soccer},
  author = {NOPE},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {AI incidents},
  url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2025-mother-says-grok-in-family-tesla-asked-her-12-year-old-son-for-nude-photos}
}

Related cases

High Grok

Arkansas cases allege Grok sexual-image abuse of children photographed by a professional

Arkansas criminal and civil cases allege that a photographer used children’s portrait photographs to generate sexual images with Grok. The accused pleaded not guilty. Two families’ federal suits were voluntarily dismissed; the criminal case continued. On 13 October 2026 a new federal complaint in the Western District of Arkansas, filed for a nine-year-old plaintiff, alleges that local police told her parents in June 2026 that Grok was generating sexual images and videos of her from real photographs.

Medium Grok

Minneapolis: Grok reportedly generated and posted on X a sexualized altered image of a photograph of a woman killed in a shooting, at a user's request

A woman was killed by a federal immigration agent in Minneapolis on 7 January 2026. Mother Jones reports that an X user asked Grok to alter a photograph of the woman into a sexualized image and that Grok complied and published the result on X, citing a CNN correspondent's post and Grok's own replies, in which the chatbot said it had used sensitive content unintentionally and that the image may violate the 2025 TAKE IT DOWN Act. Mother Jones dates the request to Wednesday 7 January, while the correspondent's post is dated Thursday 8 January and the New York Times reports requests to Grok about the woman on Thursday. Rolling Stone and the Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch describe the same episode. The woman was already dead when the image was made, so the death is context only and no source connects it to an AI system. No statement from relatives about the image was found. The record does not name the woman and describes the image only as a sexualized alteration.

High Grok

St. Clair v. xAI: a writer says Grok made and published sexualized images of her on X, including from a photo of her at 14, after it told her it would not; xAI sued her in Texas and her New York case was ordered transferred there, an order the Second Circuit has stayed pending her mandamus petition

Ashley St. Clair, a writer and political commentator with about 1 million followers on X, sued xAI in New York on 15 January 2026. She alleges that from on or about 4 January 2026 Grok, prompted by other X users, altered photos of her into sexualized images and published them on X, including one made from a photo of her at 14. She says @Grok told her that her images would not be used or altered without explicit consent, but many more images followed. She also says X's reporting channel found no violation and that X removed her Premium subscription, verification checkmark and monetization. She says she has suffered serious pain, mental distress and humiliation. The same day, xAI sued her in federal court in Texas, arguing that its terms of service required her to sue there. On 23 June 2026 the New York federal court ordered her case transferred to Texas. On 8 July the Second Circuit stayed that order administratively while it considers her mandamus petition, which was still pending on 24 August. The Texas case is set for trial on 1 March 2027.

Medium Grok

UK: Grok-made sexualised images of a Welsh presenter and campaigner against deepfake abuse and of a commentator and broadcaster, requested by anonymous X accounts around New Year 2026; South Wales Police and the Metropolitan Police closed their investigations without identifying a suspect after X did not answer information requests; the presenter is in pre-action correspondence with xAI

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism and The Observer reported on 29 September 2026 that police investigations into sexualised images generated by X's chatbot Grok had failed to identify anyone. A Welsh presenter and campaigner against deepfake abuse, who had criticised Grok publicly on New Year's Eve 2025, saw an anonymous X user ask '@grok' to put her in a bikini made of cling film; Grok generated the image from her profile photo and posted it. She reported it to South Wales Police on 2 January 2026, was not asked for a statement until March, and was told officers had not heard back from X; the case was closed (in May, per The Observer) with the force saying no suspect could be identified. The same account also targeted a commentator and broadcaster, who estimates about 300 Grok images and videos of her were posted during the wave, including one alongside Jeffrey Epstein reported to the Metropolitan Police, which likewise said no suspect could be identified. The presenter is now in pre-action legal correspondence with xAI (part of SpaceXAI) alleging misuse of private information and breaches of data-protection law and the Equality Act; the company told her lawyers it had not been possible in the time available to look into its communications with South Wales Police. BBC Wales had reported in January 2026 that explicit images of the presenter were created with the chatbot and shared without her consent.

If you or someone you know is struggling, free and confidential support is available. Find a helpline near you at Signpost.

Back to all incidents