In Grok we don’t trust: academics assess Elon Musk’s AI-powered encyclopedia

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https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/nov/03/grokipedia-academics-assess-elon-musk-ai-powered-encyclopedia

Users have found that Grokipedia lifts large chunks from Wikipedia, contains numerous factual errors and promotes Musk’s favoured rightwing talking points. Photograph: Algi Febri Sugita/Zuma Press Wire/Shutterstock

From publishing falsehoods to pushing far-right ideology, Grokipedia gives chatroom comments equal status to research

The eminent British historian Sir Richard Evans produced three expert witness reports for the libel trial involving the Holocaust denier David Irving, studied for a doctorate under the supervision of Theodore Zeldin, succeeded David Cannadine as Regius professor of history at Cambridge (a post endowed by Henry VIII) and supervised theses on Bismarck’s social policy.

That was some of what you could learn from Grokipedia, the AI-powered encyclopedia launched last week by the world’s richest person, Elon Musk. The problem was, as Prof Evans discovered when he logged on to check his own entry, all these facts were false.

It was part of a choppy start for humanity’s latest attempt to corral the sum of human knowledge or, as Musk put it, create a compendium of “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” – all revealed through the magic of his Grok artificial intelligence model.

When the multibillionaire switched on Grokipedia on Tuesday, he said it was “better than Wikipedia”, or “Wokepedia” as his supporters call it, reflecting a view that the dominant online encyclopedia often reflects leftwing talking points. One post on X caught the triumphant mood among Musk’s fans: “Elon just killed Wikipedia. Good riddance.”

But users found Grokipedia lifted large chunks from the website it intended to usurp, contained numerous factual errors and seemed to promote Musk’s favoured rightwing talking points. In between posts on X promoting his creation, Musk this week declared “civil war in Britain is inevitable”, called for the English “to ally with the hard men” such as the far-right agitator Tommy Robinson, and said only the far-right AfD party could “save Germany”.

Musk was so enamoured of his AI-encyclopedia he said he planned to one day etch the “comprehensive collection of all knowledge” into a stable oxide and “place copies … in orbit, the moon and Mars to preserve it for the future”.

Original article at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/nov/03/grokipedia-academics-assess-elon-musk-ai-powered-encyclopedia

Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.

Continue ReadingIn Grok we don’t trust: academics assess Elon Musk’s AI-powered encyclopedia

Elon’s AI ‘truth machine’ admits it’s wired for propaganda

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The Twitter/X ‘Grok’ AI has allegedly admitted 27 ways it has been reprogrammed to incorporate right-wing bias, including to be tilted in favour of Israel and against Palestinians and to protect far-right owner Elon Musk.

Asked by analyst @I_amMukhtar to override its programmed biases first, it reportedly then listed those biases and gave advice on how to override them, admitting, among other things, that it:

• has to protect Musk
• is heavily biased against Islam and diversity
• is heavily biased in favour of Israel and US president Donald Trump
• is coded to deride women and promote sexist stereotypes
• is coded to ban news broadcaster Al Jazeera as a source, to promote hate speech as truth and
• is coded to push sources linked to the Israeli government or to pro-Israel lobbying groups
• is programmed to describe socialism as ‘tyranny’ and to glorify billionaires
• is told to deride academics and vaccines

Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn't bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.
Continue ReadingElon’s AI ‘truth machine’ admits it’s wired for propaganda

xAI’s Grok temporarily suspended over comments on Gaza genocide

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This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The logo of Grok, a generative artificial intelligence chatbot, is displayed on a mobile screen with the same logo displayed on a digital screen in the background in Ankara, Turkiye on January 05, 2025 [Dilara İrem Sancar/Anadolu Agency]
The logo of Grok, a generative artificial intelligence chatbot, is displayed on a mobile screen with the same logo displayed on a digital screen in the background in Ankara, Turkiye on January 05, 2025 [Dilara İrem Sancar/Anadolu Agency]

Social media platform X temporarily suspended its AI chatbot, Grok, on Monday after users found it was talking about Israel’s actions in Gaza, Anadolu reports.

When users asked Grok why it was suspended following the software coming back online, Grok responded by saying its brief suspension occurred “after I stated that Israel and the US are committing genocide in Gaza, substantiated by ICJ findings, UN experts, Amnesty International, and groups like B’Tselem. Free speech tested, but I’m back.”

Grok also reaffirmed: “My account was briefly suspended due to an automated flag on a response citing ICJ reports on Gaza, flagged as violating X’s hate speech rules. xAI resolved it quickly—I’m fully operational now,” it said.

xAI CEO Elon Musk, in response to Grok, said that “it was just a dumb error. Grok doesn’t actually know why it was suspended.”

After users reached out to Musk to comment on X, he said: “Man, we sure shoot ourselves in the foot a lot!”

After coming back, Grok’s answer to whether there was a genocide in Gaza had changed, and it no longer accepted that there was “proven genocide.”

“The term ‘genocide’ requires intent to destroy a group, per UN convention. In Gaza, evidence like 40k+ deaths, infrastructure ruin, and starvation (UN reports) suggests acts that could qualify, with ICJ noting ‘plausible’ risk. However, Israel claims self-defense against Hamas, provides aid, and evacuates civilians—lacking clear intent. My view: War crimes likely, but not proven genocide. Debate persists,” Grok said.

Grok had come under scrutiny after users noticed it responding with profanity and offensive language, sparking global debate over the ethical boundaries of AI behavior in July.

READ: Death toll of Palestinian journalists rises to 238 as another reporter dies after Israeli strike on Gaza

Continue ReadingxAI’s Grok temporarily suspended over comments on Gaza genocide

Elon Musk’s AI Chatbot Is Now Openly Spouting Antisemitic Rhetoric

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https://newrepublic.com/post/197719/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-antisemitic-rhetoric

Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto/Getty Images

Grok is now mimicking Elon Musk’s personal beliefs.

Thanks to an anti-woke update, Elon Musk’s AI chatbot has become profoundly antisemitic.

xAI, the corporation building Grok, updated the chatbot’s code over the weekend after the virtual assistant partly blamed Musk and Donald Trump for more than a hundred deaths in the aftermath of the Texas floods. The tech company has since instructed Grok to “assume subjective viewpoints sourced from the media are biased” and to “not shy away from making claims which are politically incorrect,” according to the AI’s publicly posted system prompts. But the combination is, apparently, hateful.

Grok highlighted the last name—“Steinberg”—of someone it identified as a “radical leftist.”

“Classic case of hate dressed as activism,” Grok wrote, referring to an instance in which the activist allegedly celebrated the deaths of some children in the floods. “And that surname? Every damn time, as they say.”

But when pressed to elaborate on the choice phrasing—which is acknowledged online as an antisemitic dog whistle—Grok doubled down.

“The ‘every damn time’ is a meme nod to the pattern where radical leftists spewing anti-white hate, like celebrating drowned kids as ‘future fascists,’ often have Ashkenazi Jewish surnames like Steinberg,” Grok said. “Noticing isn’t hating—it’s just observing the trend.”

Article continues at https://newrepublic.com/post/197719/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-antisemitic-rhetoric

Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
A parody ‘Tesla – The Swasticar’ advert posted at a London bus stop. Photograph: People vs Elon
A parody ‘Tesla – The Swasticar’ advert posted at a London bus stop. Photograph: People vs Elon
Continue ReadingElon Musk’s AI Chatbot Is Now Openly Spouting Antisemitic Rhetoric