Lawsuit Alleges Google Uses Gemini AI Tool to Track Users’ Private Communications

Google is under fire (again), as a class action lawsuit was filed in federal court in San Jose, California this past November, alleging that Google uses its Gemini AI tool to illegally track private communications of its users’ of Gmail, instant messaging, and video conference applications.

Robert Burnson of Claims Journal states that, “In the past, users of Gmail, Chat and Meet were given the option to turn on Google’s artificial intelligence program. But in October, the Alphabet Inc. unit ‘secretly’ turned on Gemini for all those applications, enabling it to collect private data ‘without the users’ knowledge or consent,’ according to the complaint.”

Burnson also states that, “While the company allows users to turn off Gemini, they need to dig into Google’s privacy settings to deactivate the AI tool, according to the proposed class-action suit. Unless they take that step, Google uses Gemini to ‘access and exploit the entire recorded history of its users’ private communications, including literally every email and attachment sent and received in their Gmail accounts,’ according to the complaint.”

The case, titled, “Thele v. Google LLC, 25-cv-09704, US District Court, Northern District of California (San Jose.),” cites that Google is in fact violating the California Invasion of Privacy Act, a law enacted in 1967 to prohibit “surreptitious wiretapping and recording of confidential communications without the consent of all parties involved.”

We will be monitoring this for future outcomes.

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