Broker guide
Is Grok Safe for Client Information in 2026?
Using Grok with client material? Check data use, sharing and deletion controls before entering a loan file, and choose safer inputs for the task.
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No, don’t treat consumer Grok as safe for identifiable client information simply because training is turned off. Keep borrower documents out of personal accounts. A business service needs a separate assessment of its contract and controls before your brokerage approves client-data use.
The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) recommends keeping personal information out of publicly available generative AI tools. Its guidance on commercial AI products explains the privacy risks and the due diligence organisations need.
Identify the Grok Product and Account
Identify where you’re using Grok before applying a privacy setting. The standalone website and mobile apps use consumer terms, while Grok inside X follows X’s privacy policy. A brokerage application connected through an application programming interface (API) has a separate business arrangement.
Record the service, account owner and applicable agreement in your brokerage’s approved-tools register. A paid personal subscription doesn’t establish that your account has business data protections.
The provider’s Enterprise FAQ says business API inputs and outputs aren’t used for training, subject to arrangements that exchange free credits for training permission. It describes deletion within 30 days, with exceptions for written agreements and legal retention. Those API terms don’t establish the controls of every product carrying the Grok name.
For a business deployment, approval must cover who can access borrower material, the permitted uses and the retention terms. Review any connected application’s handling of uploads too. The model provider’s agreement covers only part of that data flow.
Training, Retention and Public Sharing
Consumer Grok can use prompts and responses for model training. Its Consumer FAQ says turning off “Improve the Model” excludes new conversations from training. Private Chat also excludes conversations from training.
Training permission and storage are separate. The consumer privacy policy covers uploaded files and generated responses, which can reproduce personal information from your input. It permits processing by contracted service providers and related companies.
The Consumer FAQ says ordinary consumer information stays for as long as reasonably necessary for the privacy policy’s purposes. Private Chat hides conversations from history. Deleted or Private Chat conversations are removed within 30 days, except for de-identified or pseudonymised data disassociated from your account, or safety, security or legal retention.
The Consumer FAQ describes conversation share links as public. Sharing one publicly can expose it to search indexing. Keep borrower details out of share links and public X posts.
Grok on X has separate training and personalisation switches. X’s help page says interactions can be used for training and warns against entering personal or confidential information. It also says feedback can permit training use of the conversation despite an opt-out.
Protecting your X posts is a separate audience control.
Keep Borrower Information Controlled
Use fictional material when a drafting task doesn’t require a real borrower’s identity or finances. Changing a name while keeping the rest of a loan file intact leaves other identifying details in place.
Consider this fictional task. A broker wants a plain-English explanation of why variable income needs supporting evidence. The source file contains a driver licence, payslips and bank statements.
Uploading that bundle gives Grok information the writing task doesn’t need.
A suitable fictional prompt is, “Write a short explanation for a borrower about why a broker requests evidence of variable employment income. Don’t infer a lender’s acceptance rules.” Keep the real documents in the brokerage’s approved system. This prompt asks for general wording without supplying identity or income records.
When an approved task needs an extract, remove identifying content before uploading it. Check the exported file for searchable text, document properties and details in filenames. Use a PDF redaction tool to remove sensitive passages, then reopen the output and check what remains.
Your brokerage’s AI policy template can define which services staff may use and which information they may enter. Include a rule for processing teams and external assistants, so a file doesn’t reach a personal AI account through a handover.
Restrict or Delete the Data
Use the controls for the interface that received the information. In the consumer app, open Settings and Data Controls to disable “Improve the model”. On the website, open Settings and Data.
The opt-out concerns new conversations, so remove unwanted earlier chats separately.
The Consumer FAQ also describes deleting selected chats or all history and removing individual share links from the share-links management page. Revoking a link controls access through that link. It can’t recall a copy someone has already made.
For Grok on X, open Privacy & Safety, then Grok & Third-party Collaborators to turn off training and personalisation. X documents “Delete Conversation History” under the Grok settings. X states deletion takes up to 30 days, subject to security or legal retention.
The consumer privacy policy provides access and deletion request routes, subject to legal exceptions and identity verification. The Consumer FAQ’s retention exceptions still apply to deleted conversations. Treat a missing history entry as evidence of the visible account state, not proof of immediate erasure from every system.
If someone enters borrower information by mistake, stop further uploads and involve your brokerage’s privacy lead. Record what was sent and any sharing involved, then request deletion through the relevant service. Keep the incident record free of unnecessary copies of the borrower’s documents.
