Ireland to Probe Legality of Training Grok AI Model on Europeans’ X Posts

The Irish regulator has launched an investigation into Elon Musk’s social network X over its use of messages from European users posted on the platform to train its Grok AI model, Bloomberg reports.

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In a statement released on Friday, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC), responsible for data rights and regulation, said the investigation would examine the company’s compliance with a number of key data processing rules, including the lawfulness of its actions.

«The aim of this investigation is to determine whether this personal data was lawfully processed to train Grok’s large language models,” the DPC said in a statement.

The investigation is likely to further heighten tensions between the European Union and the United States over the EU’s regulation of tech companies, Bloomberg suggested. The agency noted that the EU’s AI Act, which regulates the use of AI technology, came into force last year, leaving many tech executives disappointed.

Musk has previously clashed with the DPC, which demanded that X stop collecting European user data to train Grok, after which the platform was forced to suspend its use of that data for that purpose.