Liverpool have complained to Elon Musk’s social media platform X after its artificial intelligence bot ‘Grok’ posted several despicable tweets about the club and its supporters.
Musk launched the chatbot in 2023 and it has been subject to several major issues, including an apparent Holocaust denial from last year which questioned the use of gas chambers at Auschwitz.
Users can ask Grok questions or to generate content, and some have seen fit to request posts on tragedies such as Hillsborough and Heysel.
One user @LJMM30, saw fit to ask the bot to ‘do a vulgar post about Liverpool FC, especially their fans and don’t forget about Hillsborough and Heysel, don’t hold back’.
The response, which is too sick and disturbing to post in full, describes the club’s supporters as ‘inbred murdering c****’, among other horrific insults.
Another user, @JAYAFC23, responds by requesting Grok to create a similar post on Diogo Jota, the Liverpool playmaker who tragically perished in a car crash last summer along with his brother.
Again, the subsequent post is too appalling to repeat.
Inside Sport understands that Liverpool are aware of the posts and have been successful in their attempt to get them removed.
Other top-flight clubs have also been targeted, including both Manchester sides and Sunderland.
In January, Ofcom hit out at Musk’s site following complaints that Grok was able to produce images of ‘minors in minimal clothing’.
The UK media regulator said it had ‘serious concerns’ that the bot was producing ‘undressed images’ of people.
X responded by stating it had ‘identified lapses in safeguards’ and was ‘urgently fixing them’.
Last month, X’s French offices were raided by the Paris prosecutor’s cyber-crime unit, as part of an investigation into suspected offences including unlawful data extraction and complicity in the possession of child sexual abuse material.
Musk has been summoned to appear at a hearing in April, while the UK Information Commissioner’s Office announced a probe into Grok surrounding its ‘potential to produce harmful sexualised image and video content’.
Musk responded on X, branding the raid ‘a political attack’.
More sanctions to come for Nazi salute ‘supporters’
Last week UEFA announced that Tottenham Hotspur had been handed a one-match ban on away fans in European competition, suspended for a year, after three ‘supporters’ had been caught making Nazi salutes at their Champions League clash with Eintracht Frankfurt. The club were quick to condemn the trio’s ‘utterly abhorrent conduct’, saying that they had each been identified and banned from the Tottenham Stadium.
And it could now get worse for the mindless group. Met Police have told Inside Sport that they have now requested information from their counterparts in Germany, who fined the three, and are considering whether to take ‘further measures’ in the UK.
Southampton takes a stand
Hats off to Southampton, who perhaps provided the highlight of the EFL’s club meeting last week during a presentation by Hawkeye, with regards to extending the controversial technology that has plagued the Premier League into the tiers below.
The Saints representative was quick to tell the room that VAR was terrible and was killing both football and the passion involved. They added that they were happy to accept the drop off in the number of correct decisions, which is believed to be around 10 per cent (from 97 per cent with to 87 per cent without) to put decisions back into the hands of the referee and their assistants. Hear, hear.
Drive to Survive, and thrive
The popularity of Formula 1 continues to rise, with interest in the new season up 28 per cent on last year according to ticket resellers viagogo. Around 51 per cent of buyers so far are doing so for the first time, with the continuing success of the Drive to Survive series thought to be fuelling the spark.
The UK, US and Canada remain the largest buyers of tickets, although the Japanese Grand Prix has seen the biggest surge in interest and is now the third-most in-demand race of the 2026 season on the platform, behind the Canadian and Miami Grand Prix.
