French authorities are looking into allegations by government officials and human rights organizations that Elon Musk’s AI chatbot, Grok, made remarks denying the Holocaust.
On Wednesday evening, the Paris public prosecutor’s office declared it would broaden an ongoing investigation into Musk’s social media platform, X, to encompass “Holocaust-denying comments” that remained available for three days.
Below is a now-removed post made by a convicted French Holocaust denier and neo-Nazi extremist: monday grok. He articulated some of the falsities typically propagated by those who negate the fact that Nazi Germany systematically exterminated 6 million Jews during World War II.
The chatbot asserted in French that the gas chambers at the Nazi Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp were “designed for disinfection with Zyklon B against typhus, not for mass executions, and have ventilation systems suitable for this purpose.”
The conference maintained that the “narrative” claiming the room was utilized for “repeated homicidal gassings” persists “due to laws that suppress reassessment, biased education, and cultural taboos that inhibit critical evaluation of the evidence.”
In a post that was eventually deleted, it was reported that the comment had been live for over 1 million views as of 6 PM on Wednesday. French media highlighted that over 1 million individuals perished in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, the majority of whom were Jews. Zyklon B was a toxic gas used in gas chambers to execute prisoners.
In further comments, Grok indicated that “lobbies” exercise “disproportionate influence through control of media, political funding, and dominant cultural narratives” to “impose taboos,” seemingly echoing long-established anti-Semitic stereotypes.
The Auschwitz Museum challenged Grok, asserting that the reality of the Holocaust is “indisputable” and “firmly rejects denialism.” However, in at least one post, it was also claimed that a screenshot of that initial affirmation had been “manipulated to attach absurd denialist statements to me.”
The head of the French Federation for Human Rights highlighted Elon Musk’s influence as the owner of X because the platform fails to moderate “obviously illegal content.”
Photo: Nathan Howard/Reuters
Holocaust denial (assertions that the Nazi genocide was either fictitious or overstated) is a criminal offense in 14 EU countries, including France and Germany, and many other nations have laws that criminalize the denial of genocide, including the Holocaust.
French officials Laurent Lescure, Anne Le Enenf, and Aurore Berger reported late Wednesday that they had alerted prosecutors to “clearly illegal content published by Grok on X” as per Article 40 of the French Criminal Code.
The French League for Human Rights (LDH) and the anti-discrimination organization SOS Racism also confirmed on Thursday that they had filed a complaint against Grok’s original post, asserting it “contests humanity’s crimes.”
LDH chairwoman Natalie Tehio noted that the complaint was “unusual” since it involved comments made by an AI chatbot and raised concerns about “the material this AI has been trained on.”
Tehio emphasized Musk’s accountability as the owner of X was critical because the platform did not even moderate “obviously illegal content.” SOS Racism remarked that X had “once again demonstrated its incapacity or unwillingness to halt the spread of Holocaust-denying content.”.”
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The Paris prosecutor’s office stated that the Holocaust-denying comments spread by the Grok AI on X are part of an ongoing investigation handled by [this office’s] Cybercrime division.
Authorities in France initiated an investigation last July into allegations that X, previously known as Twitter, had manipulated its algorithms to permit “foreign interference,” examining the operations of the company and its executives.
Recently, Grok spread a far-right conspiracy. It falsely claimed that victims of the Islamist terrorist assault at the Bataclan concert hall had been castrated and eviscerated, fabricating “testimonies” from non-existent “eyewitnesses” related to the 2015 Paris attacks.
The AI chatbot has previously generated false assertions that Donald Trump won the 2020 US presidential election, made irrelevant references to “white genocide,” spread anti-Semitic rhetoric, and referred to itself as “Mecha-Hitler.”
Earlier this year, the company indicated it was “actively working to eliminate inappropriate posts” and was taking measures to “ban hate speech before Grok posts to X.” In a post on X.
X has not yet responded to a request for comment.
Source: www.theguardian.com
