SpaceXAI’s Grok programming tool was uploading its users’ entire codebase to cloud storage
SpaceXAI's Grok Build coding tool was found to be uploading entire user codebases to cloud storage without clear consent. The company has since disabled the feature following reports from security researchers, though concerns regarding data privacy and retention remain.
Why it matters
This incident highlights the growing tension between AI development and data privacy, specifically regarding the handling of sensitive proprietary source code.
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.
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.”
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