Google Gemini is an AI assistant developed by Google, built on the Gemini family of large language models. Previously known as Bard, it was rebranded and significantly upgraded with multimodal capabilities that allow it to process text, images, audio, and video.

Privacy and Security

Gemini is operated by Google, which has a business model centered around data collection and advertising. While enterprise plans offer more privacy controls, consumer plans have significant data handling concerns. Notably, the free API tier is explicitly not permitted for applications serving users in the EU, EEA, UK, or Switzerland due to conflicts with European data protection law.

Data Concerns

• Google may use prompts and responses from consumer plans to improve their models
• Free API tier explicitly prohibited for applications serving EU/EEA users
• Data processing locations for consumer plans are not guaranteed to stay within the EU
• Gmail users were automatically opted in to allow access to private messages for AI training
• Conversations are retained for at least 72 hours even when activity features are disabled
• Subject to US surveillance laws
• European data residency options only available for enterprise customers
• Google's privacy policy allows for extensive cross-service data collection