Apple's Dictation App Is Mistaking the Word 'Racist' for 'Trump'
Feb 26, 2025 - gizmodo.com
A bug in Apple's iPhone dictation app caused it to mistakenly replace the word "Trump" with "racist," leading to reactions from both liberals and conservatives. The issue was first identified by users on TikTok and other social media platforms, who noticed the app's error when they said "racist," and it briefly displayed "Trump." Apple acknowledged the problem, attributing it to a speech recognition model that sometimes confuses words with phonetic similarities, and announced a fix was being rolled out. Variety's tests indicated that other words like "ramp," "rhubarb," "rhythmic," and "ruffles" could also produce "trump."
The incident has fueled conservative concerns about bias in Big Tech, despite the tech industry's recent efforts to support Trump. Previous controversies, such as Amazon Alexa's election-related bias and Google's AI image generator issues, have contributed to the perception of tech companies being against conservative interests. The bug has sparked discussions about the reliability and potential biases of AI-driven technologies in everyday applications.
Key takeaways:
A bug in iPhone's dictation app caused it to mistakenly swap the word "Trump" for "racist," leading to reactions from both liberals and conservatives.
Apple acknowledged the issue, attributing it to phonetic overlaps in its speech recognition model, and is working on a fix.
The bug has fueled concerns among conservatives about perceived biases in Big Tech against them.
Previous tech-related controversies have also contributed to conservative skepticism about the tech industry's neutrality.
