Apple Downplays Concerns Using Google AI Models Will Undermine Privacy

Apple Inc., which just unveiled a revamped artificial intelligence platform built in part with Google technology, said the new approach will still preserve the company’s privacy safeguards.

Though Apple relies on Google AI models, they’re different than the ones that company uses, software chief Craig Federighi said Monday at the Worldwide Developers Conference.

“We use none of the models that Google deploys to its customers,” he said during a WWDC media event in Cupertino, California. “Your requests are completely private to you. They’re never stored. They’re never accessible to anyone.”

When customers make queries about current events, the information will pass through Apple’s in-house system, Federighi added.

The privacy issue is a balancing act for Apple, which aims to show that it can offer powerful AI features without compromising users’ security. The company also is playing catch-up with its AI strategy, which has been plagued by delays and subpar features.

“Every model is a significant leap both in quality and capability compared to our previous generation,” Amar Subramanya, Apple’s vice president of AI, said at the event. “Our goal is to match every user request to the model that provides the best response at the lowest latency.”

The most powerful of these models, known as AFM Cloud Pro, offers quality that’s “similar” to Google’s Gemini frontier models, Subramanya said. The technology was developed under the company’s Private Cloud Compute philosophy, which now extends to third-party cloud partners including Google. That approach is designed to protect privacy even when data is in the cloud.

“Apple devices are only allowed to talk to software that’s been signed by Apple,” said Sebastien Marineau-Mes, another senior executive on the company’s AI team.

Mike Rockwell, who leads engineering for Apple’s Siri assistant, acknowledged that the technology has suffered from delays. Past attempts to revamp Siri didn’t meet Apple’s standards, he said.

The new Siri, introduced as part of Monday’s software updates, is designed to be more conversational and intuitive.

“We’ve always had this vision for Siri to be the most capable and personal assistant available,” he said. “Like never before, you can ask about the information on your device and take action on that. We’ve done it in a way that’s trivially easy for people to access.”

Federighi’s session followed the main WWDC keynote, when Apple unveiled the new Siri and a trove of other AI features that will arrive on iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS and other platforms later this year. Many of the company’s latest AI capabilities are underpinned by Google’s Gemini models.

Some of the features, like ones that can tap into on-screen context and better control apps, have been long postponed. With others, Apple is hoping it can leapfrog — or at least reach parity — with the best of what Gemini can currently accomplish on the latest Android mobile devices from Samsung Electronics Co. and Google.

Siri also will act as more of a chatbot, marking a reversal for Apple. Federighi and marketing chief Greg Joswiak dismissed the idea of offering a “bolted-on” chatbot at last year’s WWDC.

When asked what had changed since then, Federighi said, “We see Siri not as a separate chatbot, but rather as an integral but conversational tool that you use in the moment, deeply integrated into your experience.”

Top photo: Apple software chief Craig Federighi helped unveil a revamped Siri and other AI features at WWDC. Bloomberg.