On November 12, according to a Bloomberg report, Google has been accused in a lawsuit of illegally tracking users’ private communications through its Gemini AI assistant across Gmail, messaging, and video conferencing applications.

Previously, users of Gmail, Chat, and Meet could choose whether to enable Google’s AI tools. However, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in San Jose, California, Google allegedly “quietly” activated Gemini in these applications in October, allowing it to begin collecting private data without users’ knowledge or consent.

While Google does allow users to disable Gemini, the class-action complaint claims that doing so requires digging deep into Google’s privacy settings to completely turn it off. The lawsuit further states that unless users take these extra steps, Google uses Gemini to access and process all private communications, including every sent and received email and its attachments within a user’s Gmail account.

The lawsuit accuses Google of violating the 1967 California Invasion of Privacy Act, which prohibits secretly eavesdropping on or recording confidential communications without the consent of all parties involved.

The above content is compiled by ModeZone, a fashion and entertainment magazine.