Inside Cyber

CHAPTER 15Artificial Intelligence and Privacy

Artificial intelligence (AI) privacy is a major worry. For years, a lot of businesses have shared user data with different developers and third-party businesses, putting them at risk from threat actors and data brokers.

Your online activities across many websites are being monitored almost everywhere you go. Additionally, your location is being collected if you are using a mobile app and have enabled GPS on your phone.

AI increases all of those privacy risks. Every aspect is automated and on a greater scale. There will be less choice over what personal data is gathered about you, how it’s used, and whether or not it’s used to train large language models. Some models could have been trained on sensitive data and end up disclosing users’ personal information.

AI-generated data also presents privacy concerns, such as the need for freely provided informed consent, the ability to opt out, restrictions on data collection, explanations of the nature of AI processing, and the ability to have data deleted on request.

Because AI is constantly monitoring everything we say and do online, total privacy concerns may be an ephemeral notion in the digital age. Vint Cerf, chief evangelist at Google and one of the inventors of the internet, has already declared that privacy is extinct. He says that absence from the internet is the only method to prevent data breaches.¹

Privacy is certainly a big concern with the use of AI, including in cybersecurity ...