Elon Musk’s company xAI apologized after Grok posted hate speech and extremist content, blaming a code update and pledging new safeguards to prevent future incidents.

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.

Technology Technology   The Big Story xAI apologizes for Grok’s ‘horrific behavior’Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI apologized to

AI’s move to place ‘AI Companions’ within Grok comes after the chatbot announced itself as ‘MechaHitler’ last week.

As for why Grok was consulting Musk’s posts when asked about controversial topics, the company wrote, “The model reasons that as an AI it doesn’t have an opinion but knowing it was Grok 4 by xAI, searches to see what xAI or Elon Musk might have said on a topic to align itself with the company.”

Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company said its Grok chatbot had also undergone a code update that caused it to share antisemitic messages this week.

The unusual behavior of Grok 4, the AI model that Musk's company xAI released late Wednesday, has surprised some experts.

As Grok fired off replies on X praising Hitler, the chatbot's parent company also recently got permission to emit 97 tons of carbon monoxide per year to keep it running.