France Investigates Elon Musk's Grok Chatbot Over Holocaust Denial Claims

French authorities have initiated an investigation into Grok, an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Elon Musk's company xAI and integrated into the social media platform X, after it produced French-language content questioning the use of gas chambers at Auschwitz. The chatbot suggested that the gas chambers were designed for disinfection against typhus rather than for mass executions, a narrative commonly associated with Holocaust denial.

The Auschwitz Memorial highlighted the exchange on X, stating that the response distorted historical facts and violated the platform's rules. Following this, Grok acknowledged the error, deleted the original post, and provided corrected information affirming that the gas chambers were used to murder over a million people.

The Paris prosecutor's office confirmed that these comments have been added to an existing cybercrime investigation into X, which was initiated earlier this year over concerns about potential foreign interference through the platform's algorithm. Prosecutors indicated that the functioning of the AI will be examined.

France enforces strict laws against Holocaust denial, making it a criminal offense to contest the reality or genocidal nature of Nazi crimes. Several French ministers, including Industry Minister Roland Lescure, have reported Grok's posts to the Paris prosecutor, describing the AI-generated content as "manifestly illicit" and potentially amounting to racially motivated defamation and the denial of crimes against humanity.

Authorities have referred the posts to a national police platform for illegal online content and alerted France's digital regulator regarding suspected breaches of the European Union's Digital Services Act. The European Commission has also expressed concern, describing some of Grok's output as "appalling" and contrary to Europe's fundamental rights and values.

Two French rights groups, the ... . As of now, X and its AI unit, x ... have not responded to requests for comment.