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.

Some X users on Wednesday asked Grok – the AI chatbot available through Elon Musk’s social media platform – questions about simple topics like baseball players or videos of fish being flushed down toilets.

Elon Musk's xAI responded to widespread reports that its Grok chatbot made claims about a genocide against white citizens in South Africa, saying there had been an unauthorized change to the artificial intelligence bot.