Google added a clarification on October 16 about using data from connected apps to personalize experiences and advertisements. The update appears in its article about Gmail smart features, originally published in 2020, and points to current documentation for connecting content apps to Search services. The company explains that certain information derived from these apps can also be used to show advertisements, depending on the user's choices.
The clarification concerns connections users choose between services, including access to information from Gmail or Google Photos for personalized answers in AI Mode and Ask Maps. October 16 is the date of the explanatory addition to Google's article. The associated documentation describes current features and settings, with gradual rollout and separate conditions covering country, language, and account.
Summaries and derived information have a separate role
According to Google, advertisements are not based directly on the contents of a Gmail inbox or Google Photos library. When apps are connected to Search services, the system can use summaries, excerpts, and inferences from relevant material to personalize the experience. The same derived information can also be used when showing ads, according to the settings applying to the account.
The company's example concerns a request for travel recommendations. AI Mode can identify information about a hotel reservation or itinerary in relevant messages, then use that context in its answer. The documentation distinguishes accessing material relevant to a request from using the complete contents of every connected application.
Google states that advertisers do not receive access to a user's Gmail inbox or photographs through these connections. In the context of Google Ads campaigns, the explanation describes information the platform uses for personalization, separately from data accessible to an advertiser. The company maintains the exclusion of sensitive categories, such as health, religion, race, or sexual orientation, from ad personalization.
Connecting apps has account and availability conditions
For the described feature connecting apps to Search, users must be signed into a personal Google Account, be at least 18, and enable Personalized Recommendations. Connecting the applications is a separate choice. In the documentation, the Google Workspace category currently covers Gmail and Google Calendar, while Google Photos has its own regional and configuration conditions.
The feature's list includes, among other markets, the United States, Canada, India, and Australia. Romanian appears among supported languages, while Romania is not listed among eligible countries and territories. Connecting Google Calendar is specified only for the United States in English. Google separately states that the Photos integration is not available in every region; support for a language does not mean that every connection is enabled in every country.
The Search services listed by Google include Search, Maps, Shopping, Flights, Hotels, Translate, and News. Personalization in AI Mode and Ask Maps uses this framework, although each experience has its own conditions. For Ask Maps, for example, the current list of languages and markets is narrower than the general list for connecting applications to Search.
For Ask Maps, the listed languages are English in the United States, Canada, India, and Australia; Hindi in India; Japanese in Japan; Indonesian in Indonesia; Spanish in Mexico; Portuguese in Brazil; and French in Canada. The content connection specified for this experience is Gmail.
The documentation also describes data use for improving AI
Google also explains how information is used to improve its services. Generative models are not trained directly on an entire Gmail inbox, Drive, Calendar, or imagery and audio in the Photos library. Instead, the documentation identifies summaries, excerpts, generated material, and inferences produced during personalized interactions as data that can be used for this purpose.
In certain situations, when an email or file is short or especially relevant to a request, the summary can be the material itself. Information about questions asked, answers and suggestions provided, and how models produced the result is also used. The company describes reducing personal information before using personalized interactions for training.
A subset of processed data is also assessed by human reviewers, including trained service providers, for debugging, safety, and service improvements. Google says interactions are disconnected from the account and personal information is reduced before review by providers, with the stated exceptions involving abuse or harm. Conditions for media from Photos are presented separately in the same documentation.
For Photos, review can concern summaries, inferences, and material generated from the library. Google states that human reviewers do not see media files from the library, except in cases involving abuse or harm and when the user submits feedback.
History and recommendations receive independent settings
In parallel, Google is gradually rolling out Search Services History and Personalized Recommendations as two independent controls over the coming months. They reflect recent choices in Web & App Activity and Search Personalization. If the previous options were off, the new settings remain off; if only history was enabled, only the corresponding history control is switched on.
Search Services History can include searches, information about pages visited through these services, AI responses, and, depending on configuration, uploaded material or audio and video recordings. Save Media is a separate control within this framework. Chrome, Gemini apps, Google Assistant, and YouTube use other history settings and are not included in this list of Search services.
Disconnecting an application and deleting material within it does not automatically remove data already saved in Search Services History. Managing and deleting that history are separate operations. According to Google, turning Search Services History off excludes future activity from generative model training, except for feedback submitted by the user. For accounts that have not yet received the new controls, history and recommendation management continues through the existing settings.
