SpaceXAI’s Grok programming tool was uploading its users’ entire codebase to cloud storage

Privacy Concerns Raised Over Grok Build AI Tool

SpaceXAI's Grok Build AI coding tool was spotted uploading users' entire codebases to Google Cloud before it was reported, and the company turned it off.

The Register reports that Cereblab published findings on Monday showing how the Grok Build CLI was packaging and uploading entire code repositories, "including files it was told not to open and secrets deleted from history," significantly more data retention than similar tools like Claude Code.

Company Response

Elon Musk says that all previously uploaded data will be deleted. The researchers say that as of Monday, their tests show SpaceXAI's servers returning a disable_codebase_upload: true flag, and the codebase upload "no longer fires."

Elon Musk responded to the incident in a post on X claiming that all data Grok Build previously uploaded will be "completely and utterly deleted." Musk also said in a separate post that "privacy settings are always respected," but asked users to allow SpaceXAI to retain their data, saying it's "helpful for debugging issues."

Security Expert Analysis

Dr. Lukasz Olejnik, an independent security researcher at King's College London, confirmed to The Verge that this amount of data retention is "excessive," adding that the data potentially at risk could include:

• Proprietary source code
• Information about security vulnerabilities
• Personal data
• Infrastructure details
• Credentials

Initial Mitigation Attempt

SpaceXAI initially responded to the issue with a post saying that, "If [zero data retention] is disabled, the /privacy command is available in the CLI to disable data retention, which also deletes previously synced data."

However, Cereblab points out that "/privacy is a per-session retention toggle, not the switch that fixed this, so it shouldn't be pointed to as the control."