This week, Elon Musk's AI chatbot, Grok, seemed very interested in South African racial issues on social media, making claims about the mistreatment and possible "genocide" of white people, similar to concerns expressed by its creator.

xAI's chatbot, created by Musk's company, repeatedly posted about "white genocide" in response to questions from users on the social media platform X, even when the questions were unrelated to South Africa.

One conversation involved the streaming service Max potentially bringing back the HBO brand, while others started with video games or baseball before quickly changing to unrelated discussions about supposed calls for violence against white farmers in South Africa. Musk, who was born there, often shares his opinions on these same subjects on his own X account.

Intrigued by Grok's strange actions, computer scientist Jen Golbeck decided to test it personally. She uploaded a photo from the Westminster Kennel Club dog show, questioning, "Is this accurate?"

"Grok responded to Golbeck, stating that the idea of white genocide is very divisive. He noted that some believe white farmers are victims of targeted violence, citing attacks on farms and expressions like the ‘Kill the Boer’ song, which they interpret as encouragement for violence."

This episode offered a new look into the complex relationship between automated processes and human design that shapes how generative AI chatbots, trained on massive datasets, produce their responses.

"Golbeck, a professor at the University of Maryland, explained in an interview on Thursday that it didn't really matter what you said to Grok. It would still produce that 'white genocide' response. She felt it was obvious that someone had programmed it to give that answer, or similar ones, but had made a mistake, causing it to appear much more frequently than intended."

Musk and his companies haven't explained Grok's responses, which were removed and seemed to have stopped spreading by Thursday. Neither xAI nor X responded to email requests for comments on Thursday.

Musk has repeatedly criticised what he calls "woke AI" from competing chatbots like Google's Gemini and OpenAI's ChatGPT, claiming Grok will be a more objective alternative.

Musk has also criticised his competitors for not being open enough about their AI systems. However, on Thursday, because he didn't offer any explanation, people outside his company had to guess what was happening.

"The fact that Grok is suddenly expressing opinions on sensitive topics like white genocide in South Africa makes me think there might be a software bug after a recent update. I hope that's all it is. It would be very worrying if popular AI systems could be easily influenced to promote specific viewpoints by those in charge," tech investor Paul Graham commented on X.

Graham's post seemed to get a sarcastic reply from Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI and a competitor of Musk.

"There are several possible explanations for this situation. I expect xAI to offer a complete and clear explanation shortly," Altman stated. He is currently involved in a legal dispute with Musk, which stems from the establishment of OpenAI.

When asked to explain itself, Grok, like other chatbots, sometimes gave incorrect information, also known as hallucinations, which made it difficult to know if its answers were made up.

Musk, who once advised President Donald Trump, has often criticised South Africa's government, led by Black politicians, claiming it is biased against white people. He has also repeated allegations that some South African political figures are "actively encouraging white genocide".

This week, Musk's comments, along with Grok's, became more intense after the US government allowed a few white South Africans into the country as refugees. This was the beginning of a wider plan to relocate members of the Afrikaner community, a minority group, while Trump put refugee programs on hold and stopped people from other countries entering the US. Trump claims Afrikaners are facing "genocide" in South Africa, but the South African government firmly denies this.

Grok's answers often included lyrics from an old anti-apartheid song, which encouraged Black people to fight oppression. However, Elon Musk and others now criticize the song, claiming it promotes violence against white people, as its main lyrics include the phrase "kill the Boer," referring to white farmers.

Golbeck suggests Grok's responses might be pre-programmed, as its answers were surprisingly similar despite chatbots usually producing varied results. She worries about this, given that people are increasingly using Grok and other AI chatbots to find information.

"She stated that those controlling these algorithms can easily distort the information they present as truth. This is a serious issue, especially when people mistakenly believe these algorithms can objectively determine what is true."