Users on Elon Musk's X came across an interesting new option tucked deep into the Settings tab on the social media platform this week.
"Allow your posts as well as your interactions, inputs, and results with Grok to be used for training and fine-tuning," reads the settings option on X, formerly known as Twitter. The option refers to X's AI chatbot Grok, which the company continues to integrate throughout the platform.
The fine print under the Settings option text goes on to say that the data is used to "continuously improve your experience" on X, but that the user's data will also be shared with Musk's AI company, xAI, which powers Grok.
It's good that X informs users of how it uses their data. It's also positive that X provides users with a choice on whether they want to share their data with xAI and X for AI training.
It's bad, however, that X opts users in by default. It's also not great that users had to seemingly discover these opt-in and opt-out options on their own.
To stop X from using your data to train its AI, there are a few steps you need to take. (Note: It appears that this setting can only be disabled on X for the web, not via X's iOS or Android apps.)
Click the Settings and Privacy option on the left-hand sidebar menu on X.
Once in the Settings tab, click on the Privacy and Safety tab.
Scroll down to the Data sharing and personalization section and click on the Grok option.
You should now see the "Allow your posts as well as your interactions, inputs, and results with Grok to be used for training and fine-tuning" setting with the checkmark box ticked. Click on the checkmark to deselect and opt out.
Under that setting, there's also an option to delete any conversation history that you have with the X's Grok AI chatbot.
Musk has big plans for his AI company. He recently floated his idea to have Tesla invest $5 billion into his xAI, which powers Grok. If X users don't want their data to be used to train Musk's next big project, they should follow the steps above.
