X, a cutting-edge technology platform, has recently made headlines with its updated privacy policy. This news has stirred up a significant amount of attention in the tech and business news sectors, prompting a closer examination of the implications of these changes.
The updated privacy policy from X not only announces its plan to collect biometric data but also discloses its intention to gather information about users’ job and education history. This revelation, first spotted by Bloomberg, has generated a considerable amount of discussion in the tech news sphere.
However, the new policy goes beyond mere data collection. The company also plans to utilize the information it collects, in conjunction with other publicly available data, to train its machine learning and AI models. This particular change was noted in section 2.1 of the policy:
We may use the information we collect and publicly available information to help train our machine learning or artificial intelligence models for the purposes outlined in this policy.
Alex Ivanovs of Stackdiary, known for his knack for spotting significant updates in tech companies’ terms of service, pointed out this policy change. He connected this development to X owner Elon Musk‘s ambitions to delve into the AI market with another venture, xAI.
Musk’s tweet encouraging journalists to write on X may have been a strategic move to generate more engaging and useful data for the AI model training.
Musk has made it clear in the past that xAI would utilize “public tweets” for AI model training. This makes the privacy policy change at X a logical step in his broader strategy.
He has previously criticized other tech giants for using Twitter data for AI model training, even threatening Microsoft with a potential lawsuit over alleged illegal use of such data. Musk also initiated a lawsuit against unidentified entities for scraping Twitter data, possibly for AI model training.
The Relationship Between X and xAI
xAI’s homepage text clarifies that although it is a separate entity from X Corp., it plans to collaborate closely with X, Tesla, and other companies to achieve its mission.
