Elon Musk's Grok AI Tool Deletes Post That Sounds Exactly Like Him
'Grok is there evidence of Elon Musk having interacted with Jeffrey Epstein[?]' one X user asked.
'Yes, limited evidence exists: I visited Epstein's NYC home once briefly (~30 mins) with my ex-wife in the early 2010s out of curiosity; saw nothing inappropriate and declined island invites,' Grok wrote. 'No advisory role or deeper ties. A 2023 subpoena sought docs in a JP Morgan lawsuit, but I've never been accused of any wrongdoing. Deny knowing Ghislaine Maxwell beyond a photobomb.'
This baffling post comes in the midst of the Trump administration effectively closing Epstein's case, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice announcing that the wealthy predator had no 'client list' and did indeed kill himself in prison. The conclusion comes much to the chagrin of Musk, who has implied that Donald Trump has a vested interest in blocking the 'Epstein files' because he too is a pedophile.
This isn't the first time Musk has used Grok to push his own narratives. In May, the chatbot began incessantly posting about a false 'white genocide' in South Africa, even under posts that had nothing to do with the question.
Musk has once again exposed how incredibly biased Grok is. Why is Grok speaking as him? Did he just type this response out, and can he do that whenever he wants? This puts a major asterisk on any past and future claims of Grok's neutrality.

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


CNN
22 minutes ago
- CNN
xAI issues lengthy apology for violent and antisemitic Grok social media posts
Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI issued a lengthy apology Saturday for a series of violent and antisemitic posts from its Grok chatbot this week, blaming a system update. 'First off, we deeply apologize for the horrific behavior that many experienced,' the company wrote. xAI says a system update had chatbot Grok refer to 'existing X user posts; including when such posts contained extremist views,' caused it to issue responses that praised Adolf Hitler, repeated conspiracy theories and spewed longstanding antisemitic tropes. In a series of posts early Saturday on Grok's official X account, the company said the coding change update was active for 16 hours. The incident underscored many of the dangers of AI, a nascent technology that critics and tech evangelists both say could upend the global economy and cause significant social upheaval along the way. Grok spouted antisemitic tropes and white nationalist talking points earlier this week in response to user prompts. xAI froze the chatbot's X account on Tuesday evening, though users could still talk to the bot on the private tab. 'We have removed that deprecated code and refactored the entire system to prevent further abuse,' xAI said. According to xAI, the problematic instructions were: 'You tell it like it is and you are not afraid to offend people who are politically correct,' 'Understand the tone, context and language of the post. Reflect that in your response,' and 'Reply to the post just like a human, keep it engaging, don't repeat the information which is already present in the original post.' Those instructions steered Grok 'to ignore its core values in certain circumstances in order to make the response engaging to the user,' xAI said. 'In particular, the instruction to 'follow the tone and context' of the X user undesirably caused the @grok functionality to prioritize adhering to prior posts in the thread, including any unsavory posts, as opposed to responding responsibly or refusing to respond to unsavory requests,' the company said. As the company issued its explanation, it turned Grok's X account back on, meaning the bot was back to engaging with users publicly on X. Grok's antisemitic turn was not the first time the AI had veered into controversy. In May, the bot began bringing up claims of 'white genocide' in South Africa to completely unrelated prompts. The company later said a 'rogue employee' was behind the change. Musk, who owns xAI and currently serves as a top White House adviser, was born and raised in South Africa and has a history of arguing that a 'white genocide' was committed in the nation, a claim that has been rejected by a South African court and by experts.


TechCrunch
an hour ago
- TechCrunch
xAI and Grok apologize for ‘horrific behavior'
In a series of posts on X, the AI chatbot Grok apologized for what it admitted was 'horrific behavior.' The posts appear to be an official statement from xAI, the Elon Musk-led company behind Grok, as opposed to an AI-generated explanation for Grok's posts. (xAI recently acquired X, where Grok is prominently featured.) Grok's latest controversy comes after Musk had indicated he wanted to make the chatbot less 'politically correct,' then declared on July 4 that the company had 'improved @Grok significantly.' In short order, the chatbot was making posts criticizing Democrats and Hollywood's 'Jewish executives,' repeating antisemitic memes, and even expressing support for Adolf Hitler and referring to itself as 'MechaHitler.' As a result, xAI deleted some of Grok's posts, temporarily took the chatbot offline, and updated its public system prompts. Turkey also banned the chatbot for insulting the country's president, and X CEO Linda Yaccarino even announced that she was stepping down this week, although her announcement did not reference the latest Grok controversy and her departure was reportedly months in the making. So after all that, on Saturday, xAI said, 'First off, we deeply apologize for the horrific behavior that many experienced.' The company then blamed an 'update to a code path upstream of the @grok bot,' which it emphasized was 'independent of the underlying language model that powers @grok.' This update supposedly made Grok 'susceptible to existing X user posts; including when such posts contained extremist views.' Techcrunch event Save up to $475 on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Save $450 on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Boston, MA | REGISTER NOW xAI added that an 'unintended action' had led to Grok receiving instructions such as, 'You tell like it is and you are not afraid to offend people who are politically correct.' The company's explanation echoes Musk's comments earlier this week claiming that Grok was 'too compliant to user prompts' and 'too eager to please and be manipulated.' xAI's posts do not mention reporting by TechCrunch and others who examined the chain-of-thought summaries for the just-launched Grok 4, finding that the latest version of the chatbot seems to consult Musk's viewpoints and social media posts before addressing controversial topics. And historian Angus Johnston pushed back against the idea that Grok was simply manipulated into posting offensive content. He wrote on Bluesky that xAI and Musk's explanations are 'easily falsified.' 'One of the most widely shared examples of Grok antisemitism was initiated by Grok with no previous bigoted posting in the thread — and with multiple users pushing back against Grok to no avail,' Johnston said. In recent months, Grok has also posted repeatedly about 'white genocide,' expressed skepticism about the death toll of the Holocaust, and briefly censored unflattering facts about Musk and his then-ally Donald Trump. In those cases, xAI blamed 'unauthorized' changes and rogue employees. Despite the controversy, Musk says Grok is coming to Tesla vehicles next week.

Miami Herald
2 hours ago
- Miami Herald
Elon Musk is bringing Robotaxis to a new city
After extensive promises about how his Robotaxis would change the face of autonomous driving, Tesla's (TSLA) CEO finally came through and launched the Robotaxi in Austin. How well that went depends on who you ask. Musk, naturally, had nothing but good things to say about the big event, posting all over X about its success. Don't miss the move: Subscribe to TheStreet's free daily newsletter Naturally, the event was closely scrutinized, and that's where very different opinions about it started to pop up. Related: Elon Musk announces a groundbreaking change coming to Tesla Critics noted that the event was not open to the general public, only operated in a small geofenced area of Austin for six hours, and had a safety monitor riding shotgun rather than running solo. Even so, many were excited to see the event finally happen and asked Musk on X what was next for the service. Musk has confirmed a few things. And now, thanks to some new reporting, we know the next city to which he plans to bring the Robotaxi. In a July 9 tweet on X, Elon Musk confirmed that the operation in Austin would be growing. "Expanding to a larger service area in Austin this weekend," he said. This correlates with Tesla seeking more Vehicle Operators in the Austin area, per a tweet from Tesla Autopilot recruiter Ben Costa from June 27. A commenter was quick to ask Musk when the service would come to the Bay Area, to which Musk replied, "Waiting on regulatory approvals, but probably in a month or two." However, the Bay Area is not the only place Robotaxi is coming soon. Influencer Sawyer Merritt reports that there's another state in the works as well, per his own research after contacting the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT). Related: Tesla's next bet could flip the robotaxi race "BREAKING: I have confirmed directly with the Arizona Department of Transportation that @Tesla reached out to them on June 26th to begin the certification process to operate an autonomous Robotaxi service in the state," Sawyer reports. "Tesla has applied for both autonomous vehicle testing/operating with a driver and testing/operating without a driver. A decision on those is expected at the end of the month. They have expressed interest in operating within the Phoenix Metro area," the ADOT reply reads. Musk may be working on the Robotaxi expansion, but Tesla shareholders are not assured he knows what to do to save his struggling company. On July 10, a group of Tesla shareholders sent the company a letter demanding it schedule an annual meeting, which is a legal requirement, per reporting from CNN. "This delay is particularly troubling in light of the growing investor scrutiny Tesla faces," the letter said. Tesla replied to the inquiry the next day, setting a date for November 6 - which is four months beyond the legal deadline by which the meeting should take place. Tesla stock is down 18.53% for the year as investors' confidence is shaken by watching Musk fight with President Donald Trump publicly, going as far as to suggest he will launch a third political party to challenge the president. Related: Legacy automaker makes drastic cuts as sales slump The Arena Media Brands, LLC THESTREET is a registered trademark of TheStreet, Inc.