Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company, xAI, says an “unauthorized modification” led its Grok chatbot to post unsolicited claims on social media about the persecution and “genocide” of white people in South Africa.

Elon Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot, Grok, has come under fire for repeatedly spreading far-right conspiracy theories about South Africa and expressing skepticism about facts regarding the Holocaust. Social media users quickly caught on to the bot's strange behavior, and the company's explanation fell flat.

Elon Musk’s chatbot Grok, developed by his artificial intelligence company xAI, shocked users on Wednesday after it responded to a question on X claiming that it had been “instructed to address the topic of white genocide in South Africa.