Elon Musk’s AI Company Acquires X, Allowing It Access to the Data of 600 Million Active Users

Elon Musk, video screenshot

Billionaire tech tycoon Elon Musk announced on X (formerly Twitter) that xAI, his artificial intelligence (AI) company, has acquired X. Critics are concerned that xAI, which developed the AI chatbot Grok that is built into X, will now have direct access to data shared by more than 600 million active users of the social media platform. 

X currently shares user data with Au10tix, an Israeli cyber security company that verifies government ID from users who pay to have verified blue check accounts.

Elon Musk aims to create a payments processing mechanism to enable people to get rid of their bank accounts and use X instead. His stated goal is “Comprehensive communications and the ability to conduct your entire financial world” on X.  No more switching apps. No more banks. Just X. He aims to create a money database with real-time processing, low fraud, and a system so big, it could become “half the global financial system.” Elon wants X to beat WeChat, the Chinese app that’s used for texting, shopping, sending money, paying bills, and even borrowing cash, which over a billion people use.

Venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Sequoia Capital, which have established crypto-focused investment funds, are invested in Musk’s xAI.

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From The Street:

On March 28, billionaire tech tycoon Elon Musk announced on X (formerly Twitter) that xAI, his artificial intelligence (AI) company, has acquired X in an all-stock transaction. The merger valued xAI at $80 billion and X at $33 billion while factoring in the latter’s $12 billion debt, Musk claimed.

 

“xAI and X’s futures are intertwined. Today, we officially take the step to combine the data, models, compute, distribution and talent. This combination will unlock immense potential by blending xAI’s advanced AI capability and expertise with X’s massive reach,” Musk wrote.

While Musk founded xAI in March 2023, he acquired Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022 and rebranded it to X in July 2023.

Soon after, former Twitter shareholders brought a class action lawsuit against Musk, alleging that he didn’t disclose his initial investment in Twitter within a legally mandated period while he was acquiring a stake in the social media company. The delayed disclosure allegedly led to the shareholders losing money.

It is known as the Rasella v. Musk case. Musk asked to have the lawsuit dismissed. Notably, a judge ruled on March 28 itself that Musk must face the lawsuit.

Read full article here…

 

Article from Cryptopolitan

Elon Musk says he wants to use X to control the entire global financial system

Elon Musk wants X to run your whole financial life. Not just payments. Not just messages. Everything. That’s the plan. He says the rebrand from Twitter to X wasn’t just a facelift. It’s the start of something bigger.

“Comprehensive communications and the ability to conduct your entire financial world,” Elon said in an interview. No more switching apps. No more banks. Just X.

Elon also said it would be the most efficient money database ever built. He promised real-time processing, low fraud, and a system so big, it could become “half the global financial system.” His words, not ours:

“I don’t know, maybe half the global financial system. Or some big number. I’m not sure what the number is, but pretty big. It would be by far the biggest financial institution.”

Musk ignores past [and current] failures and wants to build the next WeChat

Elon wants X to beat WeChat, the Chinese app that’s used for texting, shopping, sending money, paying bills, and even borrowing cash, which over a billion people use.

But here’s the problem for the golden boy. Other tech giants already tried this, and they all failed. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg had Libra, and it was supposed to be this big cross-border payments project, but it got killed by regulators and Facebook’s own users.

Google had a financial tool lined up with 11 banks that never launched. Amazon had talks with JPMorgan Chase to build a checking account, and nothing happened. Microsoft worked with BlackRock on retirement planning, and that plan disappeared too.

Only Apple got something off the ground when it launched the Apple Card with Goldman Sachs in 2019. But hilariously enough, now Goldman wants out because the product is simply not profitable enough. So yeah—there’s a track record here. And it’s not great.

Elon is already facing heat from regulators. The SEC just hit him with a lawsuit for not disclosing his stock purchases in Twitter before trying to buy the company in 2022.

Read full article here…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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MJRaichyk, PhD
MJRaichyk, PhD
21 days ago

a) I’m pleased with the current operation of ‘X’
b) Based on interacting with Grok, the key to the aiX operation.. Grok showed rather surprising libertarian ideas when ”chewing on ideas” from the patient viewpoint in discussion of medical freedom..
ERGO
I’d expect this may be a workable combination at this time…
We need to chew on the ideas about HARDENING the GRID, with Grok, and such to see what role reason and facts might have in Grok’s hands,…. as we cope with the fools in the forces of government currently totally failing
TTYL

Tom Ball
Tom Ball
20 days ago

“X currently shares user data with Au10tix, an Israeli cyber security company…” I’m positively shocked that such an “allie” would want so much control over it’s “friends”, as if they didn’t have plenty already . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Horowitz Benjamin Abraham Horowitz[4] was born in London, England and raised in Berkeley, California, the son of Elissa Krauthamer and conservative writer and policy advocate David Horowitz. He is of Ashkenazi Jewish descent. Horowitz’s great-grandparents were Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire who arrived in the U.S. in the mid-19th and early 20th centuries.[5] “In July 2024, Horowitz announced he will donate to Super PACs… Read more »

Last edited 20 days ago by Tom Ball
Suzy
Suzy
20 days ago

I’ve never had any interest in Twitter or X, and the more I see the happier I am about that.
Never have, never will.