Google saves Lens photos, Search recordings, and Translate audio for AI training
▼ Summary
– Google is introducing a new “Search Services History” setting to save images, files, audio, and video used in searches.
– This setting captures interactions like Google Lens image searches, voice searches, and phrases spoken into Translate.
– Users can disable the Search Services History setting and the “Save Media” option to prevent Google from saving these interactions.
– Google will use the saved data to “provide, d…” its search services.
Google is quietly expanding how it stores your data from Search, and the changes involve more than just text queries. In a recent email to users, the company announced a new “Search Services History” setting that will now save the images, files, audio, and video you use to search. This marks a significant shift in how the tech giant handles visual and voice inputs.
According to an update on Google’s support pages, this data collection covers a wide range of activities. It includes images captured through Google Lens, recordings from the real-time Search Live tool, voice search queries, and even phrases spoken into Google Translate. Essentially, any media you use to interact with Google Search could be stored under this new default.
For users concerned about privacy, there are options to opt out. You can disable the Search Services History setting entirely, or specifically turn off the “Save Media” option to prevent Google from retaining these interactions. The company states that this history is used to “provide, develop, and improve” its services, including training its AI models.
This move underscores the ongoing tension between user privacy and the data demands of modern AI development. As Google’s search tools become more visual and conversational, the company is clearly building a richer dataset to refine its algorithms. Whether you find this helpful or invasive, the controls are there, but they require you to actively seek them out.
(Source: The Verge)
