The Prosecutors’ Office in Ankara moved to block Grok—the artificial intelligence (AI) package operating on X, formerly Twitter—on Wednesday, July 8th. The move was prompted when, allegedly, the tool started sharing rude remarks about President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his mother—along with the Islamic prophet Muhammad (among others).
The AI chatbot also raised eyebrows worldwide with its apparent support for its self-declared role model, Adolf Hitler.
In a public statement, the prosecutors’ office wrote
Following Grok’s insults against [Turkey’s founder, Mustafa Kemal] Ataturk, our esteemed President, and the Prophet Muhammad, the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office .. applied to the criminal court … for an access ban. The court issued the access restriction order and forwarded it to the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) to be delivered to the internet service provider.
While X accepted that Grok’s language was “inappropriate,” its AI tool is deeply integrated into the platform, meaning that actually blocking it may prove beyond the expertise of the Turkish telecoms regulator. X with Grok is still operational at the time of writing.
NATO member Turkey, under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, resorts to censorship on a frequent basis, and is prosecuting journalists at the satirical magazine LeMan for a cartoon allegedly featuring Muhammad talking to Moses.
