AI safety researchers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and nonprofit organizations are speaking out publicly against the “reckless” and “completely irresponsible” safety culture at xAI, the billion-dollar AI startup owned by Elon Musk. The criticisms follow weeks of scandals at xAI that have overshadowed the company’s technological advances.

One of the new “companions,” or AI characters for users to interact with, is a sexualized blonde anime bot called “Ani."

AI released two AI "companions" on its Grok platform, a Japanese anime girl named "Ani" and an animated red panda called "Rudi."

Elon Musk’s company xAI apologized after Grok posted hate speech and extremist content, blaming a code update and pledging new safeguards to prevent future incidents.

This news comes after Elon Musk's xAI claimed that its ultimate goal is to develop a "maximally truth-seeking AI." xAI hasn't commented on the issue, making it impossible to establish whether Grok 4's responses based on Elon Musk's opinions are by design or it could be an error that the company is currently working on to resolve.

The company told workers to download employee tracking software on their personal computers, prompting privacy concerns from some staff.