Google has made a crucial update to its privacy policy. The tech giant’s updated policy now explicitly states that information that is publicly available will be used to create new AI products, enhance its services and develop innovative features.
The adjusted language in the policy confirms Google’s intentions of utilizing public data to train its AI models and improve cutting-edge products like Google Translate, Bard, and Cloud AI.
Before the update, the policy only mentioned that public information will be used to help train “language models” and Google Translate. The updated version highlights Google’s AI ambitions.
Google changed its privacy policy: "we may collect information that’s publicly available online or from other public sources to help train Google’s AI models and build products and features, like Translate, Bard and Cloud AI capabilities". Doesn't sound like Terminator, huh? pic.twitter.com/ctTO1F5FDf
— Lukasz Olejnik (@[email protected]) (@lukOlejnik) July 2, 2023
The policy change has no immediate impact on the user experience or Google’s search products. However, they also clarified that public search behavior can play a pivotal role in the development of these AI technologies.
Google is widening its focus on the AI space foraying into AI-driven shopping experiences, Google Lens features, and a text-to-music generator. Bard, Google’s AI chatbot, while having received lukewarm reception in the beginning, is now catching up with other chatbots. Google has also announced the upcoming Search Generative Experience (SGE).
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Concerns regarding privacy, intellectual property, and the potential impact on human labor and creativity have accompanied the rise of generative AI technologies. For instance, OpenAI faced a class action lawsuit for allegedly gathering vast amounts of data without authorization. Google’s ClearView AI faced scrutiny and restrictions on selling or providing access to its law-enforcement-grade facial recognition app.
The recent update to the policy could be a reaction to the controversies brewing around the development and training of AI. Google will now harness the tremendous amounts of public data available on the internet to facilitate its AI endeavors. Whether Google will be able to maintain the balance between user privacy and data usage for AI training, remains to be seen.
