Company Acknowledges Issue in iPhone’s Speech Recognition After Viral Reports

Apple has pledged to fix an issue with its iPhone dictation feature, which has been replacing the word “racist” with “Trump” for some users. The bug, initially flagged in a viral TikTok post, led to a backlash as users reported that the speech-to-text tool occasionally replaced the term “racist” with the US president’s name. This malfunction was soon shared widely across social media.

“We are aware of an issue with the speech recognition model that powers dictation and we are rolling out a fix,” an Apple spokesperson confirmed. The company attributed the glitch to “phonetic overlap,” where words with similar sounds, particularly those involving the “r” consonant, are mistakenly detected before the intended word.

The bug quickly stirred controversy, particularly among conservative commentators in the US, who have long accused major tech firms of political bias. The timing of the glitch also raised questions about Apple’s artificial intelligence capabilities, especially after it announced a significant $500 billion (£395 billion) investment in the US. This investment, which spans four years, will include a large AI research facility in Texas and the creation of approximately 20,000 research and development jobs.

The announcement followed a reported meeting between Apple CEO Tim Cook and Donald Trump, and the investment was seen by some as an effort to foster good relations with the Trump administration, which has imposed tariffs on Chinese imports, including Apple’s products. Apple had previously secured tariff exemptions during Trump’s first term, but the company remains exposed to potential tariffs on its devices, many of which are manufactured in China.

This isn’t the first time Apple has made significant investments in the US during a Trump presidency. In 2018, Apple announced a $350 billion contribution to the US economy over five years, underlining the company’s commitment to American jobs and infrastructure.

The controversy over the glitch also coincided with Apple’s recent shareholder vote on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies, where a proposal to scrap such programmes was rejected. Since Trump’s election and his executive orders rolling back federal diversity initiatives, many tech companies, including Google, Amazon, and Meta, have followed suit by reevaluating their DEI efforts, though Apple has held firm in its stance.