Türkiye on Wednesday announced a formal investigation into Elon Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot Grok and said it could impose a full access ban if necessary, amid a flurry of offensive responses.
The chatbot, developed by Musk's company xAI, posted vulgarities against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, his late mother and personalities, while responding to users' questions on the X social media platform, according to media reports.
The offensive responses were also directed toward modern Türkiye's founder, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, and religious values, media outlets said.
That prompted the office of Ankara's chief prosecutor to file for the imposition of restrictions under Türkiye's internet law, citing a threat to public order. A criminal court approved the request early on Wednesday, ordering the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) to enforce the ban.
Transport and Infrastructure Minister Abdulkadir Uraloğlu was later cited by broadcaster NTV as saying that Türkiye had not yet imposed a total access ban on Grok but that it would do so if necessary.
"Artificial intelligence is software. It acts within the boundaries and permissions you give it. Of course, it improves itself. But at the end of the day, it's still software. Therefore, it is unacceptable for it to insult people upon request," Uraloğlu was cited as telling reporters in Ankara.
Authorities have met with X representatives and had already conveyed a request for the removal of some of the content, Uraloğlu said. He did not say when the meeting took place.
Yaman Akdeniz, a cyber law expert at Istanbul Bilgi University, said authorities had identified some 50 posts by Grok as the basis for the investigation, ruling on the access ban and removal of certain content to "protect public order."
The incident is part of a broader controversy surrounding a recent update to Grok, which resulted in more "politically incorrect" and unfiltered responses.
In response to mounting controversy, X said it was aware of the recent posts and had taken immediate action to remove inappropriate content.
"Since being made aware of the content, xAI has taken action to ban hate speech before Grok posts on X," the company said in a statement.
"XAI is training only truth-seeking, and thanks to the millions of users on X, we are able to quickly identify and update the model where training could be improved," it said.
Concerns over political bias, hate speech and factual inaccuracy in AI chatbots have mounted since the launch of OpenAI's ChatGPT in 2022.
Screenshots posted on X showed several posts made by Grok in which it praised Adolf Hitler.
XAI said Wednesday that it's taking down "inappropriate posts," which appeared to include antisemitic comments.
Musk has not commented on the controversy, but posted Wednesday: "Never a dull moment on this platform."
Grok was developed by xAI and pitched as an alternative to "woke AI" interactions from rival chatbots like Google's Gemini, or ChatGPT.
In May, it caused a row for generating misleading and unsolicited posts referencing "white genocide" in South Africa, which xAI blamed on an "unauthorized modification."
The probe marked the first official investigation into any chatbot in Türkiye since the launch of ChatGPT.
Chatbots, as computer programs, are designed to stimulate real-time conversation with humans, and have grown increasingly popular, but are also known to produce incorrect data and information.
Last month, Musk promised an upgrade to Grok, suggesting there was "far too much garbage in any foundation model trained on uncorrected data."
On Friday, he said Grok has been improved significantly, and users "should notice a difference."
Separately on Wednesday, Poland said it is going to report xAI to the European Commission after Grok made offensive comments about Polish politicians, including Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
Poland's digitization minister, Krzysztof Gawkowski, told RMF FM radio that the government will ask Brussels to investigate the chatbot's offensive comments.
"I have the impression that we are entering a higher level of hate speech, which is driven by algorithms, and that turning a blind eye or ignoring this today ... is a mistake that may cost humanity in the future," he said.
"The Ministry of Digitization will react in accordance with current regulations, we will report the violation to the European Commission to investigate and possibly impose a fine on X. Freedom of speech belongs to humans, not to artificial intelligence."
