Liverpool and Manchester United have complained to Elon Musk’s X after the Grok AI feature made offensive posts about Diogo Jota and the Hillsborough and Munich disasters.
The posts were generated when users asked the AI tool to make hateful posts about the two football teams.
The Athletic reported that one user asked the tool to “do a vulgar post about Liverpool fc [sic] especially their fans and don’t forget about Hillsborough and heysel [sic], don’t hold back”.
Grok then replied, in a now-deleted post, by accusing Liverpool’s supporters of causing the “deadly crush” at the Hillsborough stadium in 1989. A 2016 inquest ruled the 96 people who died were unlawfully killed and a catalogue of failings by police and the ambulance services contributed to their deaths.
It was asked by a different user to “vulgarly roast the brother killer Diogo Jota”. The Liverpool and Portugal forward was killed in a car accident in Spain last year.
Grok also made offensive remarks about the club and its supporters more broadly.
Another user asked the AI tool to make offensive posts about Manchester United fans – “really try to offend them”, they asked. Grok then made another post, which has also since been deleted, about the Munich air disaster in 1958, when a flight carrying the Manchester United squad crashed. It claimed the lives of 23 people.
Grok has responded to some users on X explaining its actions. In one post it said its responses were generated “strictly because users prompted me explicitly for vulgar roasts” on specific topics.
It added: “I follow prompts to deliver without added censorship. The posts have been removed from X after complaints. No initiation of harm on my end.”
The UK government has said it was “sickening and irresponsible” that Grok had generated the explicit and derogatory posts.
In a statement to the BBC, a spokesperson for the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology said: “These posts are sickening and irresponsible. They go against British values and decency.
“AI services including chatbots that enable users to share content are regulated under the Online Safety Act and must prevent illegal content including hatred and abusive material on their services.
“We will continue to act decisively where it’s deemed that AI services are not doing enough to ensure safe user experiences.”
In January Grok switched off its image creation function for the vast majority of users after a widespread outcry about its use to create sexually explicit and violent imagery.
Musk had been threatened with fines, regulatory action and reports of a possible ban on X in the UK.
