Google has warned its own employees not to disclose confidential information or use the code generated by its AI chatbot, Bard. The policy isn’t surprising, given the chocolate factory also advised users not to include sensitive information in their conversations with Bard in an updated privacy notice. Other large firms have similarly cautioned their staff against leaking proprietary documents or code, and have banned them using other AI chatbots.
The internal warning at Google, however, raises concerns that AI tools built by private concerns cannot be trusted – especially if the creators themselves don’t use them due to privacy and security risks.
Cautioning its own workers not to directly use code generated by Bard undermines Google’s claims its chatbot can help developers become more productive. The search and ads dominator told Reuters its internal ban was introduced because Bard can output “undesired code suggestions.” Issues could potentially lead to buggy programs or complex, bloated software that will cost developers more time to fix than if they didn’t use AI to code at all.
Microsoft-backed voice AI maker sued
Nuance, a voice recognition software developer acquired by Microsoft, has been accused of recording and using people’s voices without permission in an amended lawsuit filed last week.
Three people sued the firm, and accused it of violating the California Invasion of Privacy Act – which states that businesses cannot wiretap consumer communications or record people without their explicit written consent. The plaintiffs claim Nuance is recording people’s voices in phone calls with call centers, who use its technology to verify the caller.
“Nuance performs its voice examination entirely in the ‘background of each engagement’ or phone call,” the plaintiffs claimed. “In other words, Nuance listens to the consumer’s voice quietly in the background of a call, and in such a way that consumers will likely be entirely unaware they are unknowingly interacting with a third party company. This surreptitious voice print capture, recording, examination, and analysis process is one of the core components of Nuance’s overall biometric security suite.”
They argue that recording people’s voices exposes them to risks – they could be identified when discussing sensitive personal information – and means their voices could be cloned to bypass Nuance’s own security features.
“If left unchecked, California citizens are at risk of unknowingly having their voices analyzed and mined for data by third parties to make various determinations about their lifestyle, health, credibility, trustworthiness – and above all determine if they are in fact who they claim to be,” the court documents argue.
