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.

The latest Grok controversy is revealing not for the extremist outputs, but for how it exposes a fundamental dishonesty in AI development.

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.

Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, has added new animated characters called “Companions” to its chatbot, Grok, for paying users of SuperGrok. These characters are avatars that you can talk to, and the first two available are Ani, an anime-style girl, and Rudy, a cartoon red panda.

Elon Musk's xAI said Grok's behavior was due to an update that caused it to prioritize engagement, even if posts contained "controversial opinions."

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.”

Grok, the chatbot from Elon Musk's xAI that went full Nazi and declared itself 'MechaHitler,' now offers a sexy anime girlfriend character.

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