Every time we frame an object with the phone camera to identify it using the potential of Lens and every time we pronounce a sentence to translate it on the fly with Google Translate or to do a search (for example with Live Search or AI Mode), we leave a digital trace. Google is radically changing the way it manages and stores these daily interactions with its multiple services through a real restructuring of its privacy options. An important innovation in this restructuring process concerns the introduction of a specific setting called “Search services history”, which will be separated from the previous and generic “Web and app activity” item. This new section will contain files, images, audio and video tracks collected not only through the classic search engine, but also through services such as Maps, Shopping, Flights, News and Translator. To prevent Google from using our data to train its AI, you need to deactivate this option.
Content that could power Google’s AI
As the technological information site testifies The Verge Google «is making some changes to how it saves Search interactions» In an email sent to users, in fact, «Google says it will save the images, files, audio and video used (by users) to search with a new “Search Service History” setting».
The whole point of this transformation is that Google will use this media content to train its generative AI models. But since it is possible to deactivate this new history, there is no need to be alarmed: with a minimum of awareness you can avoid feeding Google’s AI with your activity. Those who had already turned off tracking in the past will not have to do anything, given that the old privacy preferences will be automatically inherited by the new system, which should be released over the next few months.
Turn off history and use for AI
If you don’t like the idea of your voice or photos being used to train Google’s algorithms, there is obviously a procedure to prevent this. Just go to the My Activities page of your Google account, where the Search Services History item will soon appear. From here you can deactivate the main switch to reset all recordings. If, however, you deem it useful to keep a history of your locations or text searches done, you can simply uncheck the Save multimedia content option.
What happens to your data if you don’t change these settings? Google clarifies that information intended for AI training is separated from the identity of the individual account, thus becoming anonymous, and stored for a maximum period of four years. By deactivating the setting, however, this data will be excluded from this process, but with one exception: if we voluntarily send feedback to the artificial intelligence, for example by expressing a positive or negative opinion with the classic thumbs down or thumbs up, that fragment of interaction can still be analyzed.
The question of Gemini’s memory
A similar discussion, which requires a small compromise, also affects Gemini closely. Within the Activities section of the Gemini apps, you can choose whether to leave the recording of conversations with the chatbot active. If you opt to turn off the option, perhaps for privacy reasons, Google will still keep the chats in memory for 72 hours for technical security reasons and to process the responses, but at the same time you will give up a very convenient function: the application’s ability to remember the context and historical memory of old chats when you resume a conversation after some time, a limitation that unfortunately also applies to those who have a paid subscription.
