The AI-generated false headline was promoted by X in its official trending news section.

A shocking story was promoted on the “front page” or main feed of Elon Musk’s X on Thursday:

“Iran Strikes Tel Aviv with Heavy Missiles,” read the headline.

This would certainly be a worrying world news development. Earlier that week, Israel had conducted an airstrike on Iran’s embassy in Syria, killing two generals as well as other officers. Retaliation from Iran seemed like a plausible occurrence.

But, there was one major problem: Iran did not attack Israel. The headline was fake.

Even more concerning, the fake headline was apparently generated by X’s own official AI chatbot, Grok, and then promoted by X’s trending news product, Explore, on the very first day of an updated version of the feature.

  • @Ginger666English
    -43•2 months ago

    MUSK BAD RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE

    • @FedizenEnglish
      7•2 months ago

      “Somebody I don’t like said something bad about one of the worlds richest oligarchs therefore all criticism of him is invalid”

      The guy has enough money to protect himself from bad criticism and address narratives he doesn’t like; he doesn’t need sad pathetic losers defending him on the internet like he’s a defenseless baby.

      • @Ginger666English
        -2•2 months ago

        You people will take a statement, then do mental gymnastics in your mind to make it fit your retarded narrative.

        Holy fuck

        • CrisEnglish
          3•2 months ago

          I mean, he’s responsible for a pretty heinous thing in this instance… It’s not like people are pissing their pants over nothing.

          If your company publishes an explicitly fabricated headline stating there was a missile attack that never happened, generated by ai, and then presented to a ton of people on a major social media site, criticism is pretty deserved… (≖_≖ )