Report: Tweets with racial slurs soar since Musk takeover

X under Musk’s leadership: Substantial hate and no reduction in inauthentic activity

Numerous studies have reported an increase in hate speech on X (formerly Twitter) in the months immediately following Elon Musk’s acquisition of the platform on October 27th, 2022; relatedly, despite Musk’s pledge to “defeat the spam bots,” a recent study reported no substantial change in the concentration of inauthentic accounts. However, it is not known whether any of these trends endured. We address this by examining material posted on X from the beginning of 2022 through June 2023, the period that includes Musk’s full tenure as CEO. We find that the increase in hate speech just before Musk bought X persisted until at least May of 2023, with the weekly rate of hate speech being approximately 50% higher than the months preceding his purchase, although this increase cannot be directly attributed to any policy at X. The increase is seen across multiple dimensions of hate, including racism, homophobia, and transphobia. Moreover, there is a doubling of hate post “likes,” indicating increased engagement with hate posts. In addition to measuring hate speech, we also measure the presence of inauthentic accounts on the platform; these accounts are often used in spam and malicious information campaigns. We find no reduction (and a possible increase) in activity by these users after Musk purchased X, which could point to further negative outcomes, such as the potential for scams, interference in elections, or harm to public health campaigns. Overall, the long-term increase in hate speech, and the prevalence of potentially inauthentic accounts, are concerning, as these factors can undermine safe and democratic online environments, and increase the risk of offline harms.

X under Musk’s leadership: Substantial hate and no reduction in inauthentic activity

Numerous studies have reported an increase in hate speech on X (formerly Twitter) in the months immediately following Elon Musk’s acquisition of the platform on October 27th, 2022; relatedly, despite Musk’s pledge to “defeat the spam bots,” a recent study reported no substantial change in the concentration of inauthentic accounts. However, it is not known whether any of these trends endured. We address this by examining material posted on X from the beginning of 2022 through June 2023, the period that includes Musk’s full tenure as CEO. We find that the increase in hate speech just before Musk bought X persisted until at least May of 2023, with the weekly rate of hate speech being approximately 50% higher than the months preceding his purchase, although this increase cannot be directly attributed to any policy at X. The increase is seen across multiple dimensions of hate, including racism, homophobia, and transphobia. Moreover, there is a doubling of hate post “likes,” indicating increased engagement with hate posts. In addition to measuring hate speech, we also measure the presence of inauthentic accounts on the platform; these accounts are often used in spam and malicious information campaigns. We find no reduction (and a possible increase) in activity by these users after Musk purchased X, which could point to further negative outcomes, such as the potential for scams, interference in elections, or harm to public health campaigns. Overall, the long-term increase in hate speech, and the prevalence of potentially inauthentic accounts, are concerning, as these factors can undermine safe and democratic online environments, and increase the risk of offline harms.

The sanewashing of Elon Musk - Lawyers, Guns & Money

As Jamelle Bouie points out, Elon Musk spends a great deal of time on the social media site he owns both personally pushing and amplifying themes directly derived from prominent works of violent white supremacy, attracting very little attention from the mainstream press: Over the past month in particular, he has adopted the imagery of […]

The Musk Bump: Quantifying the rise in hate speech under Elon Musk

Since his takeover of Twitter Elon Musk has repeatedly promised to clamp down on hate speech while taking unilateral policy decisions, such as reinstating abusive accounts, that encourage the spread of hate speech on his platforms.

Study finds persistent spike in hate speech on X - Berkeley News

The new analysis contradicts the social media platform’s claims that exposure to hate speech and bot-like activity decreased during Elon Musk’s tenure.

Elon Musk posted about race almost every day in January

Many social media posts by Tesla CEO on his platform are indiscernible from those of white supremacists, say experts

Elon Musk reportedly forced Twitter algorithm to boost his tweets after Super Bowl flop

A tweet from Joe Biden garnered triple the impressions than Musk’s game time post, sending Twitter engineers scrambling to boost their boss

Grok Becomes ‘MechaHitler,’ Twitter Becomes X: How Centralized Tech Is Prone To Fascist Manipulation

This week, Elon Musk’s Grok AI started spewing extreme antisemitism, responding with conspiracy theories about Jewish people, and for a brief period telling people to call it “MechaHitl…

Musk’s AI Grok bot rants about ‘white genocide’ in South Africa in unrelated chats

X chatbot tells users it was ‘instructed by my creators’ to accept ‘white genocide as real and racially motivated’

The Weird, Fragmented World of Social Media After Twitter

The common forum that Elon Musk destroyed will never be replaced—and that’s okay.

Twitter Is Dead, X Is Elon’s Personal Propaganda Platform, Where Grok Checks His Feed Before Answering

Last week, Elon Musk’s Grok AI started spewing extreme antisemitism, calling itself “MechaHitler” and pushing conspiracy theories about Jewish people. But that wasn’t the mo…

How Elon Musk uses his X social media platform to amplify right-wing views

As X’s owner and most followed user, Elon Musk has increasingly used it as a microphone to amplify his political views and those of the often right-wing figures he’s aligned with.

Elon Musk's Grokipedia Pushes Far-Right Talking Points

The new AI-powered Wikipedia competitor falsely claims that pornography worsened the AIDS epidemic and that social media may be fueling a rise in transgender people.

Yes, Elon Musk created a special system for showing you all his tweets first

After his Super Bowl tweet did worse numbers than President Biden’s, Twitter’s CEO ordered major changes to the algorithm.

Elon Musk’s X Is A Misinformation Machine—And Black Women Saw It Coming - Essence

For years, Black women have sounded the alarm about digital manipulation. X’s new policies prove how right they were.