Meta, the tech giant behind Facebook and Instagram, has been leveraging public posts and photos to train its AI, sparking concerns over privacy. In July, Meta paused the launch of its AI product in Europe due to stringent General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) rules, which required the company to halt using European data without consent. As a result, European users now have the option to opt out of this data scraping.
However, the situation is different for Australian users. During a parliamentary inquiry, Meta’s director of the privacy policy, Melinda Claybaugh, revealed that while Europeans have the ability to opt-out, no such option is available to Australians. Claybaugh explained that the data scraping only applies to publicly available posts and is limited to users over 18. Despite this, she did not confirm whether an opt-out option would be extended to Australians in the future.
Senator Tony Sheldon, who chairs the inquiry into AI adoption in Australia, expressed concerns over the disparity in privacy options. Greens senator David Shoebridge noted that Australians would have to retroactively set all their posts to private if they wish to prevent their data from being used.
