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How a chatbot error can affect the US election.
Five US Secretaries of State have written an open letter to Elon Musk, expressing serious concern about the spread of false information about Vice President Kamala Harris on the social network X.
The Grok chatbot incorrectly reported that Harris could not be included on the ballot for the 2024 election. The secretaries demanded immediate changes to the Grok chatbot so that voters receive accurate information during a critical election year.
On July 21, just hours after President Joe Biden announced that he was suspending his campaign, Grok began answering questions about Harris ' participation in the election with the false claim that the deadline for submitting documents for participation in elections in 9 states had already expired. In fact, the deadline for submitting documents has not expired, but misinformation from Grok quickly spread among millions of users of the X platform and beyond, before it was corrected on July 31.
Despite the fact that Grok is only available to X Premium and Premium+ subscribers, and contains a warning about the need to check information, false data about the deadline for submitting newsletters was repeatedly reproduced and distributed in numerous posts. State secretaries said this could seriously damage the electoral process and mislead voters.
The secretaries of State, who are the top election officials in their respective states, object not to Grok, but to its factual inaccuracies and the company's slow pace in correcting incorrect information. Grok's reports have sparked a public debate over whether Harris can be a legitimate candidate for president, despite the fact that she announced her intention within the deadline. Another version of false information from Grok related to the fact that the ballots for the upcoming elections are already "filled in and ready", which is not true.
The secretaries noted that this year, OpenAI collaborated with the National Association of Secretaries of State to provide voters with correct information about the election, and ChatGPT was programmed to direct users to the election site. In the letter, the secretaries noted that Grok has not entered into such partnerships, and urged X to immediately adopt a policy of referring Grok users to the site when requesting information about the US election.
Source
Five US Secretaries of State have written an open letter to Elon Musk, expressing serious concern about the spread of false information about Vice President Kamala Harris on the social network X.
The Grok chatbot incorrectly reported that Harris could not be included on the ballot for the 2024 election. The secretaries demanded immediate changes to the Grok chatbot so that voters receive accurate information during a critical election year.
On July 21, just hours after President Joe Biden announced that he was suspending his campaign, Grok began answering questions about Harris ' participation in the election with the false claim that the deadline for submitting documents for participation in elections in 9 states had already expired. In fact, the deadline for submitting documents has not expired, but misinformation from Grok quickly spread among millions of users of the X platform and beyond, before it was corrected on July 31.
Despite the fact that Grok is only available to X Premium and Premium+ subscribers, and contains a warning about the need to check information, false data about the deadline for submitting newsletters was repeatedly reproduced and distributed in numerous posts. State secretaries said this could seriously damage the electoral process and mislead voters.
The secretaries of State, who are the top election officials in their respective states, object not to Grok, but to its factual inaccuracies and the company's slow pace in correcting incorrect information. Grok's reports have sparked a public debate over whether Harris can be a legitimate candidate for president, despite the fact that she announced her intention within the deadline. Another version of false information from Grok related to the fact that the ballots for the upcoming elections are already "filled in and ready", which is not true.
The secretaries noted that this year, OpenAI collaborated with the National Association of Secretaries of State to provide voters with correct information about the election, and ChatGPT was programmed to direct users to the election site. In the letter, the secretaries noted that Grok has not entered into such partnerships, and urged X to immediately adopt a policy of referring Grok users to the site when requesting information about the US election.
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