All of the dominant technology firms are integrating generative AI into their online services, from Google to Meta, Microsoft and Apple.
Google’s recent integrations of Bard, its chat-based AI tool, with a number of Google apps and services is one example of moving generative AI more directly into consumer life via text, image, and voice interactions. Bundled with every little thing from Gmail, Docs, and Drive to Google Maps, YouTube, Google Flights and hotels, Bard has the potential to act as a super-charged version of Google Assistant, culling enormous amounts of information online but personalizing responses to individual user data, all while working in a conversational, natural-language mode. Summarizing emails, booking trips, creating shopping lists — anything that is perhaps done by a private assistant — for individuals who haven’t got a private assistant.
After 2023’s major leap in the general public consciousness about generative AI, next 12 months individuals and businesses will probably be making much more decisions with AI at the middle. One good example: how people travel. Generative AI will move from a behind-the-scenes driver of efficiency to the foreground, with the concept of an intelligent concierge changing consumer searches, payments, and decisions. “It is going to make trips more accessible, with fully voice-enabled chatbots offering easy translation and acting on behalf of a traveler,” said Eduardo Schutte, senior vice chairman at Amadeus, a worldwide travel technology company.
For planning, the method will probably be more like talking to a travel agent, but one with access to an almost unlimited amount of information, data that could be searched immediately and aligned with the person. Beyond easy data points like price and date, more holistic concepts equivalent to purpose will enter into the search process. “With generative AI, the aim of a visit, expectations, willingness to pay, and more, could be more easily identified through chatbot conversations,” Schutte said.
The interactions won’t end while on trips. Coming to a fork within the road on a mountain climbing trail, a user might take an image of the signage and ask Google Bard which way is a greater bet for somebody with an already-tired eight-year-old in tow. “Content will probably be adapted to what the traveler is searching for, while conversational generative AI chatbots will probably be used to ask the appropriate questions to grasp traveler preferences,” Schutte said.
But with the increasing use of AI, and the benefit of incorporating it into day by day life for individual profit, concerns about consumer privacy are receiving fresh attention. At probably the most basic level, tools like Bard and the power to enhance the web shopping experience via personalized recommendations and streamlined product searches can create potential security risks, in line with Tal Zamir, CTO of cybersecurity company Perception Point. “The AI’s deep integration into users’ data raises concerns about unauthorized access and misuse, making it crucial for shoppers to balance convenience with data protection measures,” Zamir said.
By now, after a long time on the web, consumers should mostly realize this and take the safety measures which might be available. And for probably the most part, consumers have accepted the risks in favor of the apparent rewards.
“Consumers who use Bard are giving up a few of their personal data in exchange for the advantages of the tool,” Zamir said.
AI use inside online experience has been growing for years already, even when not in as transparent a way as gen AI tools specifically for the buyer.
Google has been using AI in search algorithms for years without consumers focused on opt-in provisions related to AI specifically, said Max Starkov, hospitality and online travel industry technologist, consultant and digital strategist. The outcomes generated by AI, he says, are the subsequent phase within the “zero click” search results world that Google has been moving closer to in recent times. “Google is already implementing gen AI behind the curtains to enhance the precision of their ‘no click required’ answer boxes,” he said.
Whether ChatGPT — which can also be coping with questions of information exploitation — or Google, gen AI models are moving from early advances being trained on “dead” data to gaining more knowledge from the ever-evolving web and real-life search and pathing behavior of users. Online shopping and travel booking is a repository of individual user psychology and preferences, with aspirations and goals layered into seemingly innocuous research for a latest camping tent.
What did you search? When did you search? Was the reply box sufficient to reply your query/query or did you click on a link? Which link did you click on from the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages).
A seek for camping gear by someone who has also searched up to now rather a lot for Star Wars and climate change might get really useful sustainable campaign bags featuring Han Solo. Or planning a visit to Florida may turn up Airbnbs near the Hemingway House for somebody who has ordered “A Farewell to Arms” or “For Whom the Bell Tolls.”
Google is positioning Bard as a complement to online search slightly than a latest enhanced version of it. “A creative collaborator,” said a Google spokeswoman, which she added is getting used in ways which might be different from how people typically search for information with Google Search.
“Persons are coming to Bard for help with all styles of projects — like writing resumes, creating workout routines and planning dream vacations,” she said.
The corporate says it’s also clear about the protection of private information with content from Gmail, Docs and Drive, “not seen by human reviewers, utilized by Bard to indicate you ads or used to coach the Bard model.”
And the spokeswoman said users are in command of privacy settings — deciding the way to use these extensions, including the power to show them off at any time.
Web privacy watchdogs remain wary.
For Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy (CDD), a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization — who has been tracking the web from a consumer privacy standpoint for the reason that Nineteen Nineties — the newest AI is an extension of a business model that has roughly been the identical for a long time. Clearly, AI has a number of positive implications, Chester said, in health innovation, for instance. “But principally, it’s just one other shattering of the glass by way of privacy and identity and autonomy,” he added. And its powers of persuasion make a concentrate on the buyer tradeoffs much more critical. Implicit in the company view that AI will understand you higher than ever before is a possible rewiring of society, “and what you purchase and eat,” he said.
Within the case of Google, some old privacy scores have just been settled. Regulators proceed latest work on the underlying issues — on a broad scale. The FTC began a “industrial surveillance” rulemaking process in late 2022, with an update expected in the primary quarter of 2024. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is proposing rules to rein in data brokers. President Biden’s executive order on AI also calls on regulators to act.
But Chester, who speaks directly with FTC officials, and describes the present leadership as notable for being “privacy forward,” says that despite the numerous regulatory promise of the FTC and CFPB efforts, AI and privacy has not yet been “on the map” in the way in which it must be.
“I do not take a look at it as a latest revolutionary approach but a continued evolution within the interests of firms and advertisers to know exactly who you’re, and what you’re doing,” Chester said. “AI will up the ante on all of it.”
Consumers have at all times had options — equivalent to removal of cookies, privacy-aware browsers — but practically speaking, most people accept what they get in return for sharing. “It’s the unique sin of the web and it’s too late to repent all digital sinners,” Chester said. “Who’s going to say, ‘I don’t need my supermarket to have data, so I do not get discounts? Or Waze, so I do not know where the pharmacy is?” Chester said.
Bard extensions are expected to turn out to be much more personalized and integrated with the web shopping experience, in line with Zamir, including mechanically filling out checkout forms, tracking shipments, and comparing prices mechanically. All of this entails risk, he said, from unauthorized access to private and financial information in the course of the automated form-filling process, malicious interception of real-time tracking information, and even potential manipulation of price comparison data.
“The advantages of Bard must be weighed against the potential dark consequences, and consumers must exercise caution and prioritize their privacy before embracing Bard or other AI-powered tools,” Zamir said.