Google's new policy may let Gmail and Photos data fuel personalized ads

Google has altered its privacy policy, adding language that could let the company use data from Gmail, Drive and Google Photos to serve personalized advertisements when users activate AI-driven features like Personal Intelligence or Gemini Apps. The change, effective Oct 16, states that consent to share this data enables services such as Search to process it for ad customization, though advertisers will not receive direct access to the content or identifying details and ads will exclude sensitive topics such as race or health.

The policy ties the data use to users opting in to allow these services to improve recommendations. Those wishing to avoid ad targeting can disconnect the relevant apps or turn off personalized recommendations via the Search Services Personalization settings page. This marks a shift from Google's earlier stance of not using these services for ad targeting.