X Petitions FTC to End Twitter Privacy Order as Grok AI Data Questions Resurface

Source Domain: www.techtimes.com

Elon Musk’s X has asked the Federal Trade Commission to scrap the privacy order that has governed the platform for years, and on June 3 the agency opened public comment on the request. The petition matters to anyone who still posts on X, because the order is one of the few binding US checks on how the company handles user data, and X is tying its case directly to its push to build the Grok artificial intelligence system. Comments are open until July 2, after which the Commission will vote on whether to grant the request.

For a reader, the immediate stake is concrete: the same posts and Grok conversations at issue in this fight are still being fed into Musk’s AI by default for US accounts. Whether that pipeline keeps running with federal oversight or without it is what the FTC is now deciding.

X Wants the 2022 Order Gone Sixteen Years Early

X Corp. is asking the FTC to set aside or modify its 2022 settlement so the order ends at the close of 2026 rather than running its full term. According to the FTC’s call for comment, the petition makes four arguments: the order was imposed on a company that no longer exists and whose responsible staff have all departed; it no longer serves a valid purpose and imposes millions of dollars in needless compliance costs; lifting it protects First Amendment values; and removing it is critical to advancing American leadership in artificial intelligence.

That last argument is the new element. X frames the privacy order not as a closed chapter from the Twitter era but as an active obstacle to AI development. The public now has until July 2 to weigh in through the FTC’s docket, and the agency has said the full Commission will vote on how to resolve the petition after the window closes.

The Order Exists Because Twitter Sold Security Data for Ads

The oversight X wants gone was not arbitrary. In May 2022, months before Musk bought the company, the FTC charged Twitter with deceptively using security data and imposed a $150 million penalty. The…

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