X changes terms of service to let its AI train on subscriber’s posts

When X unveiled its newest terms of service, which go into effect on November 15, users quickly picked up on one change.

“By submitting, posting or displaying Content on or through the Services, you grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to make your Content available to the rest of the world,” the terms of services said.

It added, “This includes the right to analyze any of that content including, for example, for use with and training of our machine learning and artificial intelligence models, whether generative or another type.”

This means that by continuing to use the platform, users will agree that X can use their data to train its AI models.

Using content to train AI has become a major issue as the technology booms. On X, artists and others in the creative space are worrying about their work being used – not just on X but to train computers that could someday replace human creators entirely. Other users say they are concerned about personal information in their tweets being used that way. Some users said on the site they have already begun deleting photographs of them from their feeds.

And if users have any issue with those terms, they may end up in a federal courtroom that is favoured by conservative activists who are already presiding over two lawsuits involving Musk-owned X.

According to the update, all disputes related to the terms will be brought to the US District Court for the Northern District of Texas or state courts in Tarrant County, Texas.

Tarrant County is more than 100 miles away from X’s new headquarters outside of Austin, Texas.

X’s terms said any users who continue to use their products or services on or after November 15 would be agreeing to the updated terms.

Before the most recent terms of service update, X users could opt out of sharing data by going to “settings,” and then “privacy and safety.”

Under the “data sharing and personalization” header, there is a tab for “Grok” where users can uncheck the box that allows the platform to use their data for AI training but it’s not clear whether X’s new terms of service take away that option. X can now license all the content on the platform, including using it in its machine learning and artificial intelligence models.

While such broad licensing with few limitations is not uncommon for a social media platform, Alex Fink, CEO and founder of Otherweb, an AI-based news reading platform that targets misinformation, told CNN that what makes X unique is that its new terms “remove any ambiguity” in contrast to other platforms that don’t spell out their intentions.

Before, X said posts from private accounts would not be used to train Grok. However, the language in the new terms of service does not differentiate between the types of accounts.