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Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

malwarebytes.com

21–30 of 61 posts

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#21
post #19

Link for the lazy: https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/general Find "Smart Features", uncheck, and press save, which will reload Gmail. Then find "Google Workspace smart features" and click the "Manage Workspace smart features settings" button and unselect everything.

What do you believe you have gained by throwing those switches?

It makes Gmail a normal email client again?

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#22
Ha ! I disabled the smart features in gmail and then used gemini to ask something unrelated. The massage ended with:

"By the way, to unlock the full functionality of all Apps, enable Gemini Apps Activity." with a link to myactivitydotgoogledotcom

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#23

From the dialogues in the pictures it doesn’t sound like they are using anyones emails for training. The messaging indicates it’s more like using as context and/or generating embeddings for RAG. Unless there’s something else I’m not aware of. I know that Google does a lot of bad stuff but we don’t need to make up stuff they just aren’t doing This doomsday messaging an alarmism is only serves to degrade the whole caus…

Discovering new settings that I was opted in to without being asked does not scream good faith.

Separately, their help docs are gibberish. They must use this phrase 20 times: "content is not used for training generative AI models outside of your domain without your permission." Without telling you if that checkbox is that permission; where that permission is set; or indeed, even if that permission is set. From reading their documentation, I cannot tell if that checkbox in gmail allows using my data outside my organization or not.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#24

From the dialogues in the pictures it doesn’t sound like they are using anyones emails for training. The messaging indicates it’s more like using as context and/or generating embeddings for RAG. Unless there’s something else I’m not aware of. I know that Google does a lot of bad stuff but we don’t need to make up stuff they just aren’t doing This doomsday messaging an alarmism is only serves to degrade the whole caus…

>When smart features are on, your data may be used to improve these features. Across Google and Workspace, we’ve long shared robust privacy commitments that outline how we protect user data and prioritize privacy. Generative AI doesn’t change these commitments — it actually reaffirms their importance . Learn how Gemini in Gmail, Chat, Docs, Drive, Sheets, Slides, Meet & Vids protects your data. When I click "Learn mo…

I agree. What I really don’t like is that we have to choose between having smart search and giving up our data.

Is it too much to ask to be able to not give up data for “improvements” but keep the functionality?

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#25
post #8

Oh Well, I left gmail years ago, now it is used for junk mail, good luck loading ads going to gmail into your AI :)

What did you move too? I was thinking of moving my personal email off of Gmail for a while. It's just 15+ years of accounts to untangle. I long made a "spam/unimportant site verification " account, so that's set.

My own domain.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#26
post #19

Link for the lazy: https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/general Find "Smart Features", uncheck, and press save, which will reload Gmail. Then find "Google Workspace smart features" and click the "Manage Workspace smart features settings" button and unselect everything.

What do you believe you have gained by throwing those switches?

I think I’m improving my security posture. For example, I’d hope that prompt injection attacks against Gemini AI will be less likely to scoop my data.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#27
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They disable so many features when you remove "Smart features" i.e. Grammar, Spelling, Autocorrect, Smart Compose/Reply (those templated suggested replies), Nudges, Package tracking, Desktop notifications. Google really wants to punish you for doing that.

Turning off the inbox categories feature was particularly annoying. A feature they had for a good decade before deciding they weren't jsut happy with collecting my data.

Yep I went through this sad journey with my gmail this week. Got tired of seeing "coming soon" packages cluttering up my inbox, so I looked into how to turn them off. It turned off the categories. Reminds me of the dark pattern used by many apps, where if you turn off notifications to avoid ads/spam, you also lose useful notifications.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#28
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They disable so many features when you remove "Smart features" i.e. Grammar, Spelling, Autocorrect, Smart Compose/Reply (those templated suggested replies), Nudges, Package tracking, Desktop notifications. Google really wants to punish you for doing that.

Turning off the inbox categories feature was particularly annoying. A feature they had for a good decade before deciding they weren't jsut happy with collecting my data.

It is unbelievably manipulative that they tied this organizational feature with this new LLM-training scam they have running now.

Learning to not rely on inbox categories does make it easier for me to finally leave Gmail for a real email provider though, so maybe this will all work out in the end.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#29
post #6

They're claiming that these options allow Google to use your data to train its AI, but that's not what it says at all. Where are they getting that idea from?

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/15604322?sjid=1029580...

> When smart features are on, your data may be used to improve these features.

Re: Gmail can read your emails and attachments to train its AI, unless you opt out

#30

From the dialogues in the pictures it doesn’t sound like they are using anyones emails for training. The messaging indicates it’s more like using as context and/or generating embeddings for RAG. Unless there’s something else I’m not aware of. I know that Google does a lot of bad stuff but we don’t need to make up stuff they just aren’t doing This doomsday messaging an alarmism is only serves to degrade the whole caus…

>When smart features are on, your data may be used to improve these features. Across Google and Workspace, we’ve long shared robust privacy commitments that outline how we protect user data and prioritize privacy. Generative AI doesn’t change these commitments — it actually reaffirms their importance . Learn how Gemini in Gmail, Chat, Docs, Drive, Sheets, Slides, Meet & Vids protects your data. When I click "Learn mo…

> It may not do it now

I don't believe "may" is being used to indicate possibility, but rather permission.

That is to say, there's no reason to think it's not being used, given that wording.

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