Google Starts Scanning All Your Photos As New Update Goes Live
Forbes • • technology
Key Points:
- Google Photos’ latest update introduces Personal Intelligence, an opt-in AI feature that scans users’ entire photo libraries to create personalized AI-generated images using actual photos of users and their loved ones.
- The update integrates Google apps with the Gemini AI platform, allowing it to access calendar events, emails, and photos to provide more context and personalized results without requiring detailed user input.
- Google emphasizes privacy by stating that Gemini does not directly train its models on private photo libraries, though limited data from prompts and responses may be used to improve functionality; users can opt in or out at any time.
- Early reviews praise the feature for enhancing personalization and reducing the need for detailed descriptions in AI image generation, but critics raise concerns about privacy and the potential creepiness of such deep personal data use.
- Users can track which photos Gemini uses for image creation via a "Sources" button, allowing transparency about the images influencing AI-generated content.
