100M Emails, 500M Chats: Google's Bid for Bankrupt Spirit Airlines' Data to Train AI Raises Privacy Alarm

[u/terenscendent]

https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/google-spirit-airlines-data-privacy-dispute-1824685

[u/AutoModerator]

Hello u/terenscendent, please make sure you read the sub rules if you haven't already. (This is an automatic reminder left on all new posts.)

---

Check out the r/privacy FAQ

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/terenscendent]

From the article:

Google's $10 million bid for bankrupt Spirit Airlines' internal business, including 100 million emails and 500 million Microsoft Teams messages, has triggered a privacy dispute involving more than 120 US lawmakers who warn that sensitive employee information could be exposed in the race to train artificial intelligence (AI) models.

[u/BopSupreme]

Google be evil

[u/00lalilulelo → u/BopSupreme]

It's more like they won't do anything that's not evil at this point.

[u/press_F13 → u/BopSupreme]

Schizos were right, saying it is data hungry and will devour all of web if it could...

[u/Substantial-Sky4079 → u/BopSupreme]

Yes and don’t forget those politicians that enable them

[u/MrBloodyshadow → u/BopSupreme]

don't be evil

don't, be evil

[u/japanintlstudent]

W T F this should not even be possible

[u/camojorts]

This shows how desperate the largest brute-force AI companies are to get their hands on any kind of non-AI-corrupted data

[u/nondescriptzombie → u/camojorts]

Data without AI poisoning is the new pure steel unpoisoned by the 1950's atomic tests.

[u/camojorts → u/nondescriptzombie]

Nicely put

[u/sayaxat]

It's insane if this is allowed. It's insane that companies do this.

[u/PatchyWhiskers]

This will train AI agents to act like a dysfunctional company that went bankrupt. Well done.

[u/press_F13]

What is AI optimising at this point, corpo doublespeak? Ykw that is possible even without tracking everything (/s...),  there is only so much ways, to be condescending with smile ...

[u/SharpParking2706 → u/press_F13]

Synergy! Flywheel! KPIs. Evergreen. Let me double click on that.

[u/saltyjohnson]

Everything you do at work and/or on work devices or networks is owned by work and any soulless MBA could decide to sell it to somebody who would then have no obligation to handle it with care. That treasure trove of data has not only these employees work communications, but also could have:

• photos: don't take pictures on work devices, and keep cameras covered and disabled when not in use
• location history: don't bring your work phone to places
• passwords to personal accounts
• login cookies and session tokens to personal accounts
• any other myriad tracking cookies that could be used to tie identities together across hundreds of different tracking networks
• phone contacts: keep your homies' numbers out of your work phone
• Windows Recall screenshots and whatever other crap
• credentials to home wifi networks: make a separate network for work devices if you must connect them to wifi at home

[u/DejongBCN]

No shit? This should be banned of course. 

[u/tsoxiko]

There may be a id theft issue with this if personal information is attached to these emails and chats..

Mr or Mrs joe or jane blow may or may not have agreed to privacy disclaimers,but they agreed to them with spirit…not google..

When spirit died…so did legal agreements.

[u/Extension-Two-2807 → u/tsoxiko]

Yes this is an important distinction.

[u/Grumpy_Ontarian_III]

That data should be deleted.

[u/Extension-Two-2807]

My guess is they will take out specific identifiers to comply with privacy law. Still VERY messed up.

[u/Sir_Henry_Deadman]

That's a crazy plan I never even thought about till now

[u/vassadar]

SpaceX also bid for the data also