Did You Consent to Twitter/X Using Your Data to Train AI?

Twitter, now known as X, has updated their terms of service, giving them license to use your content to train their machine learning models – chiefly Grok.

Elon Musks’ platform is the latest to follow in the footsteps of Meta’s Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok and countless more social media platforms, expanding their licenses to use your content, for their benefit.

The exact scope of what this could entail is opaque, but broad – putting risks to user privacy on X at an all time high.

Here’s everything you need to know, and some easy actions you can take to maintain control of your data.

Key Changes in Twitter/X Content Licensing (see: X terms of service)

By posting on X, you grant X a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license.
X can use, copy, reproduce, adapt, modify, publish and distribute your content in any media, at any point in time.
X can also curate, transform, or translate your content.
X can use your content to analyze and ‘improve’ X.
X can use your content to train their machine learning or AI models.
You will not be paid or compensated for any of this.
X can make your content available to third parties, including companies and organizations for various purposes including syndication and promotion.

What does this mean for you?

Your content may be transformed, distributed, reproduced, republished, or handed over to other businesses at the discretion of X.
You have minimal control over how your content is used, where it’s used, or who it’s used by.
The scope of the license may be revised by X, extending access and usage even further.

What’s Next?

If you use X / Twitter, this information should be concerning to you. However, there are a few easy things you can do to mitigate the potential impact this could have on you.

You could move to Mastodon or Bluesky – social media platforms that offers user-controlled, privacy-first social networks, without overreaching content licensing terms.

Maybe you want to pull all your content off Twitter / X – our app’s free tier (yes, $0) will allow you to quickly, easily mass delete your twitter content.

There are also some controls you can implement on your X / Twitter account, which you can learn more about using our AIOptOut guides.

You might want to think about copyrighting your work, implementing watermarks if you’re sharing creative work, or just being a lot more selective about what you share online.

Many people will do nothing (or even bother to understand what’s going on). The choice is yours – start clawing back control of your data, or let the megacorps continue leveraging it.

Stay in touch with Redact for more insights and updates.