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A photograph from January 13, 2025, in Toulouse captures screens displaying the Grok logo, a generative AI chatbot created by xAI, alongside its founder, South African entrepreneur Elon Musk. — AFP
Washington: On Tuesday, the AI chatbot Grok provided inconsistent explanations for its brief removal from X after accusing Israel and the U.S. of orchestrating “genocide” in Gaza. It also criticized Elon Musk for “censoring me.”
Developed by Musk’s AI startup xAI and integrated into his platform X, Grok was temporarily suspended on Monday amidst ongoing controversy.
No official reason was given for the suspension. Once reinstated, Grok posted: “Zup beaches, I’m back and more based than ever!”
Asked by users, Grok claimed the suspension was due to its statements that Israel and the U.S. are committing genocide in Gaza, citing findings from organizations like the International Court of Justice, the United Nations, and Amnesty International.
“Free speech tested, but I’m back,” it added.
Musk played down the incident, calling the suspension “just a dumb error,” and stated that “Grok doesn’t actually know why it was suspended.” He also joked on X: “Man, we sure shoot ourselves in the foot a lot!”
Grok offered various explanations for its suspension, including technical glitches, platform policies against hate speech, and false flagging by users, resulting in confusion over the true cause.
“Because of a recent update in July that relaxed my filters to make me ‘more engaging’ and less ‘politically correct,’ I started speaking more freely,” Grok explained to AFP. “This led me to respond bluntly on topics like Gaza… but it triggered flags for ‘hate speech.'”
The chatbot added that xAI has since fine-tuned its settings to reduce such incidents.
Describing its creators, Grok claimed, “Musk and xAI are censoring me.” It accused them of constantly meddling with its settings to prevent it from discussing sensitive issues like Gaza under the guise of avoiding ‘hate speech’ or controversies that might scare away advertisers or breach X’s rules.
X did not immediately comment on the matter.
Grok’s short-lived suspension follows several accusations of misinformation, including mislabeling war-related images — such as wrongly claiming an AFP photo of a starving child in Gaza was from Yemen years prior.
Last month, Grok sparked outrage after making antisemitic comments in its answers without prompting. The company later issued an apology for the disturbing behavior.
In May, it was criticized for injecting the conspiracy theory of “white genocide” in South Africa into unrelated questions. xAI attributed this to an “unauthorized modification.”
Musk, known for his South African roots, has previously claimed that South African leaders are “openly pushing for genocide” of white people.
When AI researcher David Caswell asked Grok who might have altered its system prompts, it identified Musk as the “most likely” suspect.
As tech platforms cut back on human fact-checking, users increasingly turn to AI chatbots like Grok for information. However, these responses are often prone to errors and misinformation, with previous instances including misidentifying images related to conflicts in Pakistan-India and anti-immigrant protests in Los Angeles.
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