> With Gemini Apps Activity turned off, their Gemini chats are not being reviewed or used to improve our AI models.
Indeed bizarre as the statement doesn't say much about data collection or retention.
More generally, I'm conflicted here -- I'm big on personal privacy but the power & convenience that AI will bring will probably be too great to overcome. I'm hoping that powerful, locally-run AI models will become a mainstream alternative.
These big tech companies are so frustrating. Why does every single aspect of our digital lives need to be monitored? It’s like whack a mole trying to get the most basic of privacy.
Things like these make me glad to have a Xiaomi phone with their minimal implementation of Google instead of a full on Android phone. I get to avoid this stuff being pushed on me, and I don't use any of the Xiaomi "AI" stuff (which wouldn't support foreign apps anyway).
Granted, my data is definitely being sent to Xiaomi analytics, fixed by NextDNS. Re: governmental influence, I'd prefer Chinese to US (then again, that is my ethnicity bias). Recent events make the two governments look more similar than ever.
The whole situation is still clear as mud to me. What if I don't have the Gemini app installed, how do I get to its configuration screen? Is the component which exfiltrates the data part of the Gemini app, or is it a separate Android component which also has to be removed? What if I didn't receive that email?
Gemini being able to read WhatsApp messages (when explicitly asked) and take actions can be convenient. If it does so without prompting or feeds the data back into their model in any way for training - that's a big no.
There's a lot of business happening on WhatsApp. I don't think Google cares that much about the messages I sent to my family (although it helps with profiling and ad targetting) but I bet the real money is understanding what people are buying and how they do commerce in WhatsApp.
Documentation is unclear, but it appears Gemini is always connected to Utilities, and Utilities is always connected to Whatsapp, and the data flow between these apps is not documented.
I wonder what meta will do, they recently introduced meta ai inside WhatsApp (even though I didn’t enable it, or asked for it), it’s just floating there.
With Gemini having access, those who are happy to give AI access to their apps would surely prefer Gemini as it will be phone wide instead of meta ai which only runs inside WhatsApp.
I don't see what the problem is. If the User doesn't want Gemini to read his or her messages, the User doesn't have to partake in the sending of the messages. Simple! A User agrees to be bound by the ToS (Terms of Service) in having they do take to receive the user agreement as bound in law by Google. The User doesn't need to understand or have the right to contest the agreement or the use of any data created by a User, as the User can simply not use the product or service as governed by the same Google ToS. Simple!
Google has been working on this since November last year going by the wayback archive of the support page for this feature.
I'm not seeing any indication that Gemini can read your messages, though. You can compose messages and start calls, but I can't get it to read me any of my messages. In fact, I can't even get it to send messages to group chats, only to individual contacts.
The feature makes a lot of sense, of course. WhatsApp is to many countries across the globe what texting and calling is to Americans. If your smart assistant can't even interact with WhatsApp, it's basically useless for many people.
What Gemini can’t do with WhatsApp
Read or summarize your messages
Add or read images, gifs, or memes in your messages
Add or play audio or videos in your messages
Read or respond to WhatsApp notifications
If you connected Google Assistant to WhatsApp, it seems like data may flow that direction, but then you've already hooked WhatsApp into Google before so I don't think anyone will be surprised there.
Does anyone know how I can make Gemini read messages? I can't even find the assistant settings necessary for that stuff to function.
In the year 2025 I can’t think of any reason a person would use Signal instead of WhatsApp. All your friends and family should move to Signal if that is your excuse.
The whole situation with Gemini Apps Activity setting is so frustrating. Even if I pay for Gemini Pro, the only way to make sure there will be no human looking at your chats is to set Apps Activity to off, which means you don't have any history for Gemini chats, even for the messages from a minute ago.
Apparently, my personal account being a gsuite account is to my benefit this time as "your administrator has not enabled access to Gemini for your account".
I hope the EU sues the shit/existence out of them for exfiltrating private conversations and violating the secrecy of correspondence without explicit consent
Tech corporations and their managers are basically data rapists
WhatsApp backup on your Google account contains all your message history, and is unencrypted. If you use google cloud backup for your phone, Google can read your WhatsApp messages, and has been able to do so for more than 5 years now.
More surprising is that people think this is the first time - be default your WhatsApp backups are unencrypted by default so they have had the access for long time for large part of the userbase. Also primary reason why WhatsApp hasn’t been a problem for law enforcements.
People have been clowning on Apple for being behind on the AI stuff and -- while I'd never defend how they promised a bunch of features in 2024, showed them in ads, and sold iPhones based on vaporware, but still haven't shipped most of the features -- I will say, I imagine a lot of the hold-up is because they realized how dangerous it is to start trusting AI with the sensitive data on your phone. It's probably not too hard to make it work most of the time, but even if there's a 0.0001% chance the AI will send a sensitive image meant for your wife to your boss, you should probably reconsider shipping.
I don't believe Google has the tact to care as long as they look like a market competitor in something.
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[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 145 ms ] threadIndeed bizarre as the statement doesn't say much about data collection or retention.
More generally, I'm conflicted here -- I'm big on personal privacy but the power & convenience that AI will bring will probably be too great to overcome. I'm hoping that powerful, locally-run AI models will become a mainstream alternative.
I do not use WhatsApp, but I have other apps I do not want google to see.
Granted, my data is definitely being sent to Xiaomi analytics, fixed by NextDNS. Re: governmental influence, I'd prefer Chinese to US (then again, that is my ethnicity bias). Recent events make the two governments look more similar than ever.
https://support.google.com/assistant/answer/9984245?hl=en
Documentation is unclear, but it appears Gemini is always connected to Utilities, and Utilities is always connected to Whatsapp, and the data flow between these apps is not documented.
1. Security > Privacy > Convenience 2. Security > Convenience > Privacy 3. Privacy > Security > Convenience 4. Privacy > Convenience > Security 5. Convenience > Security > Privacy 6. Convenience > Privacy > Security
We told you this would happen.
With Gemini having access, those who are happy to give AI access to their apps would surely prefer Gemini as it will be phone wide instead of meta ai which only runs inside WhatsApp.
I'm not seeing any indication that Gemini can read your messages, though. You can compose messages and start calls, but I can't get it to read me any of my messages. In fact, I can't even get it to send messages to group chats, only to individual contacts.
The feature makes a lot of sense, of course. WhatsApp is to many countries across the globe what texting and calling is to Americans. If your smart assistant can't even interact with WhatsApp, it's basically useless for many people.
Edit: ah, that explains why I can't make Gemini read my messages to me, Google's own documentation (https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/15574928) says it can't:
If you connected Google Assistant to WhatsApp, it seems like data may flow that direction, but then you've already hooked WhatsApp into Google before so I don't think anyone will be surprised there.Does anyone know how I can make Gemini read messages? I can't even find the assistant settings necessary for that stuff to function.
Tech corporations and their managers are basically data rapists
I don't believe Google has the tact to care as long as they look like a market competitor in something.