If you use Google, you are training its AI. Here’s how to unsubscribe.

Consider this an overdue public service announcement: A recent change to Google’s privacy settings allows the company to store more of your data, including media like “photos, files, audio and video recordings,” to improve its AI models. In other words, if you upload any media to Google search services, it will be used to train the AI ​​unless you opt out.

The change came via a secret update to Google’s search services privacy settings, announced in June via a customer email. With the update, the company is essentially co-opting people into this expanded AI training under the guise of giving users more control over their saved history and personalized recommendations.

The update introduced two new settings, Search Services History and Personalized Recommendations, allowing you to configure how your activity is used to personalize your Google experience and how long web and app activity is saved.

This update applies beyond Google Search itself, and also includes other search services such as Maps, Shopping, Flights, Hotels, Translation, and News.

For example, when you use Google Lens to visually search for something by taking a photo, that photo may now be saved for AI training.

Likewise, if you are using the latest Direct search Voice input search feature in the Google app, and these audio recordings can be saved, as with any other Google voice search. If you use Google Translate to practice speaking, this audio will be saved as well.

The changes reflect a broader industry shift toward collecting data by any means necessary to improve AI services. Instead of relying solely on information scraped from the web, Google and others are increasingly collecting data that people upload or create when using their services. Meta is another example of a consumer-facing technology company doing so at scale, Training AI on users’ photos And the media, as well as on Content recorded by artificial intelligence glasses.

Google confirms the use of media training directly, explaining in that email to customers: “Like your search service history, saved media is also used to develop and improve Google services and technologies, including artificial intelligence models and safety measures.”

that it Help documentation He echoes this, noting that the company “uses your history to deliver, develop, and improve its services (such as training generative AI models) and to protect Google, its users, and the public with the help of human reviewers.”

Some of this storage space is temporary and tied to running the product, but in Google’s own language, it can also hold saved media specifically for training its AI.

Adjust your settings

The good news is that you have some control here. You can change your preferences at History of search services and Customize search services Pages. In the first option, you can uncheck the Save Media box separately from the Search Services History box, or uncheck both. You can also configure how often you want saved data to be automatically deleted – after 3 months, 18 months, or 36 months.

From there you can Go to this page To search other privacy settings, including web and app activity, timeline, YouTube history, and more.

In addition to saved media, Google also uses your search history, location, and other information from the websites you visit to personalize your experience on Google, including which ads you are shown.

Before this update, Google allowed you to configure saved historical search data through your Web & App Activity settings. This is now split into two settings: Web & App Activity Data and a new Search Data setting, which is on by default.

This means that if you make a change to your web and app activity data retention settings in an attempt to opt out of having your data stored by the tech giant, the update will no longer affect your use of Google’s search services, as it is now a separate option.