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Gmail users warned to opt out of new feature - what we know
(www.newsweek.com)
Thanks for making it easy, friend. It takes a lot of clicking to turn this stuff off lol.
Not to be a downer, but I'm confident Google scans every email with AI regardless.
People should still opt out, but we know Gmail itself is entirely compromised.
Seems like you can’t disable from the web? I’ve never used a Gmail app, always used via imap. Fucking hate having to download an app to turn this off. Not my primary email address, but it is my secondary. Should change that…
On browser view you can't, but I switched to desktop view and it came up. The settings page on browser is fucking embarrassing.
You have been automatically OPTED IN to allow Gmail to access all your private messages & attachments to train AI models.
"Feature"
I'm not seeing where any of this gives Google permission to train AI using your data. As far as I can see it's all about using AI to manage your data, which is a completely different thing. The word "training" appears to originate in Dave Jones' tweet, not in any of the Google pages being quoted. Is there any confirmation that this is actually happening, and not just a social media panic?
The only option is smart features, on or off. That requires Google to read the email to categorize them and do a lot of basic stuff. It doesn't let you narrowly have more privacy on specific features. It's all or nothing, and if you get a lot of emails then it's hard to turn it off if you already use categories. Google always does all or nothing because they know people need some of it, same with location. It has to be precise location tracking to use things, you can't just do rough location.
Yes, but the point is that granting Google permission to manage your data by AI is a very different thing from training the AI on your data. You can do all the things you describe without also having the AI train on the data, indeed it's a hard bit of extra work to train the AI on the data as well.
If the setting isn't specifically saying that it's to let them train AI on your data then I'm inclined to believe that's not what it's for. They're very different processes, both technically and legally. I think there's just some click-baiting going on here with the scary "they're training on your data!" Accusation, it seems to be baseless.
So you think that they're not using your data simply because they're not telling you that they are? Don't be naive. Since when are these companies asking for permission? I'm not even confident opting out does anything. At this point, your safest bet is to not use their services.
So they are using AI but not in a capacity that would make it learn? Doubt
Yes, exactly. Training an AI is a completely different process from prompting it, it takes orders of magnitude more work and can't be done on a model that's currently in use.
It's not ai specific. It's literally everything including basic stuff like sorting newsletters into its own category. That's why I said it's all or nothing. It's just called " smart features" and they've had it for a decade, long before ai became a thing. But if you decline then you decline everything. That's how they do it. They make a huge category and if you decline then you decline everything including things that are considered pretty basic.
Not that I've seen, no.
I would opt out just in case. I remember using Adobe Acrobat at work and noticed they read every single PDF and generate a few comments about it even when you never asked them to. Meaning they‘re scanning through potentially confidential data. I have no doubts Google will do the same sooner or later.
Understand that basically ANYTHING that "uses AI" is using you for training data.
At its simplest, it is the old fashioned A/B testing where you are used as part of a reinforcement/labeling pipeline. Sometimes it gets considerably more bullshit as your very queries and what would make you make them are used to "give you a better experience" and so forth.
And if you read any of the EULAs (for the stuff that google opted users into...) you'll see verbiage along those lines.
Of course, the reality is that google is going to train off our data regardless. But that is why it is a good idea to decouple your life from google as much as possible. It takes a long ass time but... no better time than today.
Understand that basically ANYTHING that "uses AI" is using you for training data.
No, that's not necessarily the case. A lot of people don't understand how AI training and AI inference work, they are two completely separate processes. Doing one does not entail doing the other, in fact a lot of research is being done right now trying to make it possible to do both because it would be really handy to be able to do them together and it can't really be done like that yet.
And if you read any of the EULAs
Go ahead and do so, they will have separate sections specifically about the use of data for training. Data privacy is regulated by a lot of laws, even in the United States, and corporate users are extremely picky about that sort of stuff.
If the checkbox you're checking in the settings isn't explicitly saying "this is to give permission to use your data for training" then it probably isn't doing that. There might be a separate one somewhere, it might just be a blanket thing covered in the EULA, but "tricking" the user like that wouldn't make any sense. It doesn't save them any legal hassle to do it like that.
A lot of people don’t understand how AI training and AI inference work, they are two completely separate processes.
Yes, they are. Not sure why you are bringing that up.
For those wondering what the actual difference is (possibly because they don't seem to know):
At a high level, training is when you ingest data to create a model based on characteristics of that data. Inference is when you then apply a model to (preferably new) data. So think of training as "teaching" a model what a cat is, and inference as having that model scan through images for cats.
And a huge part of making a good model is providing good data. That is, generally speaking, done by labeling things ahead of time. Back in the day it was paying people to take an amazon survey where they said "hot dog or no hot dog". These days... it is "anti-bot" technology that gets that for free (think about WHY every single website cares what is a fire hydrant or a bicycle...)
But that is ALSO just simple metrics like "Did the user use what we suggested". Instead of saying "not hot dog" it is "good reply" or "no reply" or "still read email" or "ignored email" and so forth.
And once you know what your pain points are with TOTALLY anonymized user data, you can then "reproduce" said user data to add to your training set. Which is the kind of bullshit facebook, allegedly, has done for years where they'll GLADLY delete your data if you request it... but not that picture of you at the McDonald's down the street because that belongs to Ronjon Buck who worked there one summer. But they'll gladly anonymize your user data so the picture of you actually just corresponds to "User 25156161616" that happens to be the sibling of your sister and so forth...
in fact a lot of research is being done right now trying to make it possible to do both because it would be really handy to be able to do them together and it can’t really be done like that yet.
That is literally just a feedback loop and is core to pretty much any "agentic" network/graph.
Go ahead and do so, they will have separate sections specifically about the use of data for training. Data privacy is regulated by a lot of laws, even in the United States, and corporate users are extremely picky about that sort of stuff.
There also tend to be laws about opting in and forced EULA agreements. It is almost like the megacorps have acknowledged that they'll just do whatever and MAYBE pay a fee after they have made so much more money already.
Yes, they are. Not sure why you are bringing that up.
I am bringing it up because the setting Google is presenting only describes using AI on your data, not training AI on your data.
i probably agreed to 'smart' something, long ago for spellcheck and others. they've expanded those options a lot. i no longer need google spellcheck. firefox since the chrome went downhill
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I just opted out of Gmail
That site is cancer on mobile. Can anyone TLDR this article for me?
Has the steps and is relatively short
It would've been nice if malwarebytes had actually fact checked those steps to turn off smart features for the app on mobile. Because as they are right now, it only works on the desktop version of gmail.com despite what they claim in the steps themselves.
Here's how to turn it off on iOS:
- Open the gmail app
- Tap on the hamburger menu (top left) and scroll all the way down and tap on "Settings"
- Go to "Data privacy" option in the settings menu (they omitted this step on Malwarebytes)
- Turn off "Smart features"
i closed reader view and scrolled just to see and wow the POPUPS and 50% of the page length being ads
WHAT
who uses the internet like this and finds it acceptable?!
Google extended their Smart features with AI. It can be disabled in the settings, presumably if you haven't already.
I visited Gmail earlier today, and it gave me onboarding with information and the choice of enabling or not. I'm in the EU, dunno if that makes a difference.
On the web UI they sneakily slide in the Gemini icon exactly where the settings icon is after about 2 seconds of loading the page which caught me out for the first account I was updating. Really annoying.
I logged into my GMail account for the first time in years due to this (I normally just use it as an IMAP server.) The "smart features" were already turned off.
It would certainly be nice if we could have sources of information about these kinds of privacy issues that didn't lie their asses off constantly to create hysteria, but I guess that's too much to ask for.
Glad I have uBlock installed so at least this site didn't get any ad revenue from me.
It was already on for me I had to disable it. I appreciate the warning.
I'm honestly kinda surprised that Google is apparently not in fact doing this already and (according to the comments here) continues to not do so.
They don’t give a shit about what the law or terms say. They’ll just do whatever and if caught pay pennies on the dollar in fines.
We’ve seen them do this and win time and time again with the google library project and other actions. All the AI companies are training on any and all data they have access to, laws be damned. It’s the MO for any new venture capital / tech project with unlimited profits if someone gets there first.
It would be par for the course if they just ignored the settings changes when it comes to training their AI on your data, and you're just turning off your access to the AI features instead.
good thing my gmail is full of spammy bullshit.
I for one won't opt out because the only thing I get is spam and work shit. Go ahead train the AI off spam. The vast majority of emails are spam.
Yeah my gmail is mostly for spam. I dont get any real emails to it.
Does anyone have a good in depth guide on how to de-google? My ultimate goal is to not use Google at all and use Graphene OS on my Pixel
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLR_ghQEN2SgB5ZpiIIzlJvtXhXHfEf1M7
TheHatedOne on YT has some good resources
You can also find degoogle lists with alternatives for each app, e.g. here: https://git.tycrek.com/archive/degoogle
My advice to you is to take one step at a time, explore at your own pace. It's easy to get overwhelmed, but IMO each step is beneficial on its own. E.g. instead of moving to Proton.me in one night (or any other email provider), first start by forwarding the emails and see if you're ok with the product
There's no guide since everyone's use case is different, and 100% is only obtainable if you avoid all tech. GrapheneOS or buy an iPhone are the best options. I went the grapheneos route, but I still use google play services as I found its the safest way to still get apps for now, and the disconnect from google is still much more than using stock android. I moved email to proton, maps I use OsmAnd.
Oh nice. Can you still install banking/credit card apps with Graphene? I've heard it can be a pain in the ass to get around
I think it depends on the bank
I don't use any banking apps, but from what I've seen on forums it can be hit or miss depending on the bank. I only use their webpages. If my bank required an app, I'd find a different bank.
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I mean... Just don't use Google services!?
What kind of guide or in depth are you looking for? It's a broad field. Google covers a lot.
So what you’re saying is that all of Epsteins emails are going to be used to train Gemini? Interesting…..
I already disabled all that "smart" crap years ago.
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this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2025
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