EU to probe use of personal data by X's AI chatbot

Ireland's data protection watchdog, acting on behalf of the European Union, launched an inquiry Friday into the use of personal data by Elon Musk's platform X to train its AI chatbot, Grok.

The probe relates to the "processing of personal data comprised in publicly-accessible posts posted on the 'X' social media platform" by EU users, said the Data Protection Commission (DPC).

"The purpose of this inquiry is to determine whether this personal data was lawfully processed in order to train the Grok LLMs (Large Language Models)," said the DPC statement.

Grok is the name of a group of LLMs -- or generative artificial intelligence models -- developed by Musk, which can be accessed on his social media platform X.

Last year, after X began using personal data in public posts made by European users, Ireland's DPC launched a court case arguing that this violated users' data privacy rights.

As X has its European headquarters in Ireland, the country's data protection commission is the lead regulator in Europe for the social platform.

Last August, X said it would work with the DPC after agreeing to suspend its use of the data, prompting the DPC to drop its case.

The social media platform has continued to develop new AI models since then.

The Irish authority said Friday it would probe "compliance with a range of key provisions" of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), including whether data has been processed with "lawfulness and transparency".