WhatsApp’s AI Now Remembers Your Life — Is Convenience Worth the Cost?

In Android 2.25.11.13 beta version, WhatsApp is working on a memory feature for Meta AI which allows Meta AI to remember certain details that users have shared during conversation. Information like conversation style, dietary choices, allergies, personal interests and all kinds of important things will now be memorized by Meta AI so users can have a smooth conversation with it.

This feature is still being tested and is available for beta testers, but WhatsApp is currently rolling it out for the public as well. In Meta AI’s chat settings, WhatsApp has added a “Memory” option as well and users can click on it to store details to the AI chatbot manually. This will also allow the AI chatbot to give more user-specific and relevant suggestions.

This feature will really be helpful for users who often have conversations with Meta AI because they won't have to make it more personalized for them every time. By remembering things from the users, Meta AI will prioritize their preferences and give them responses that stand out. Meta AI’s memory feature is available to some regular WhatsApp users as well now and Meta is working to enroll this feature to more users soon so everyone can benefit from it.

This move by Meta clearly follows a growing trend in the AI industry. Big players like Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT have already introduced memory features that let their chatbots remember past conversations — not just a few points, but entire chat histories that can be recalled anytime. It sounds useful, sure, especially for smoother, more personalized chats. But it also raises big privacy questions. These AI models are essentially storing everything users say, and often using that data to improve their systems. That means your personal details might be helping to train future versions of the AI. And in the long run, there’s always the risk that law enforcement or government agencies could pressure these platforms to hand over user data for surveillance. So while Meta’s new memory feature might make conversations easier, it feels like they’re just following the same path as the rest — whether that ends up being a win for users or not, only time will tell.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Study Finds Openness to AI’s Utility But Concern Grows Over Chatbots Replacing Real Human Relationships

With the rise of AI and AI chatbots, many people have made them a part of their regular lives and they are using them for all sorts of things. Some even see these AI chatbots as their friends or even romantic partners but this can be very risky. Stanford Deliberative Democracy Lab published a report in partnership with Meta after surveying people to understand what they feel about AI chatbots and their limits. 1,545 people from Germany, Brazil, the US, and Spain were surveyed for this study.

According to the report, people know the efficiency and advantages of AI but don't seem too enthusiastic when it comes to using it for companionship. When respondents were asked if they were open to AI chatbots answering offensive topics, most participants were open to it while 40% felt unsure or were totally against it. The split between people about this query is interesting because there have always been discussions about free speech in the media but most people view it as a concern when it comes to AI chatbots.

Respondents of the survey were also asked if they were concerned about AI being designed to appear human-like and most of them agreed that they would be concerned about it, especially if they don't know that they are interacting with an AI bot. This is relevant to Meta introducing AI bot profiles across its apps where bots are designed to interact like real-life people. But users say that they need to know if they are speaking with AI so they don't get misled into thinking that they are interacting with a real person.

Another question the study asked was if the participants were comfortable about using AI chatbots as romantic partners and it was found that most of them were uncomfortable with the idea of using AI chatbots for romantic relationships. Some even say that there should be restrictions about preventing users from developing romantic relationships with AI chatbots while some say that users should be allowed to interact with AI chatbots however they want as long as it's within legal boundaries. This is a risky area where more study and research should be done to know about the mental health impacts of romantic involvement with AI.

Image: AIgen

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Meta’s AI Faces Legal Fire as Authors, Scholars Unite Over Copyright Clash

A small group of law professors is siding against Meta for its unconsented use of eBooks to train Llama AI models. They recently filed a new brief that went in favor of authors suing the tech giant for the same reason.

The incident took place yesterday, when the filing arose at the US District Court for the Northern District of California. This is where Meta was called out on its defense claims for fair use. Many referred to this as an overwhelming request for more legal privileges inside courts than what was granted to human authors.

The recent use of these copyrighted works was to train the generative models, which many don’t see as transformative. After all, using works for such reasons isn’t unique from using them to educate authors, it shares. It was similarly called out as the real purpose to enable creations that compete with such copied products across similar markets is one done by Meta for profitable reasons. Therefore, it’s more commercial than anything else.

The International Association for Scientific, Medical, and Technical Publishers also shared a short brief about authors and how they favored their calls for justice. The same was the case for Copyright Alliance, which again works on a nonprofit basis and stands for artistic creators throughout broad copyright disciplines. Even the AAP or Association of American Publishers felt the same way.

Hours after the piece was shared, Meta’s rep recalled how there were some smaller groups of law professors who supported the company’s legal standing on this front. In that case, they were all in agreement about how Meta was violating all intellectual property rights by making use of ebooks for training different models. They got rid of copyrights from these sources to disguise the allegation that they were taking part in.

Meta shared how its training is fair, but this case needs to be dismissed as the authors lack the basis to sue correctly. During the month’s start, the American District Judge enabled the case to move ahead. While he did dismiss some parts, he stated that such allegations are serious. The fact that Meta is accused of purposefully getting rid of CMI to hide copyright infringement speaks volumes.

Image: DIW-Aigen

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by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Top AI Models Fail Simple Debugging Test — Human Coders Still Reign Supreme

According to a new study by Microsoft Research, AI models are still struggling to fix software bugs that can easily be handled by skilled developers. AI is now being widely used for different tasks with companies like Google and Meta using it for programming and coding. But they are failing when it comes to fixing software bugs, with models like OpenAI’s o3-mini and Anthropic’s Claude 3.7 Sonnet failing a code benchmark called SWE-bench Lite. This shows that AI models are still not able to replace human programmers and developers.

The authors gave 300 software debugging tasks from the SWE-bench Lite to nine AI models, and the results showed that even the strongest and latest AI models couldn't complete even half of the tasks. Claude Sonnet 3.7 was the best-performing model but with only a 48.4% success rate, followed by o1 and o3-mini with success rates of 30.2% and 22.1% respectively.

This has made the authors and experts question why these AI models are performing poorly. The researchers say that the main issue with these AI models was the lack of training data and they weren't able to see actual examples of how humans debug software. The authors suggest that if we want to improve the performance of AI models, we have to train them on specialized and detailed data. Many studies have already shown that there are many logic errors and security flaws in codes generated by AI.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Greenpeace Study Reveals an Increase in Global Emissions Because of Production of AI Chips

According to a new study by Greenpeace that analyzed the effects of AI on our planet, it was found that there was a 4× increase in emissions because of AI chips in 2024, which are produced during the making of semiconductors for AI chips. Most of these chips are made by companies like SK Hynix and TSMC which supply these chips to NVIDIA and others. These chips are made in countries like South Korea, Taiwan and Japan where most of the electricity depends on fossil fuels and hence, the rise in global emissions. Greenpeace also reported that the global electricity demand for AI is going to grow 170 times by 20230 and this could result in worse climate pressures.

Bloomberg reports that these estimates by Greenpeace have raised concerns about carbon emissions. It is suggested by Greenpeace that countries in Southeast Asia should switch to renewable energy sources for chip production. But the opposite is happening because South Korea is planning to build power plants that use natural gas and Taiwan is also working to expand liquid natural gas to upgrade its power grid for AI demands.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has also done a study which suggests that data centers in the US are going to use more than half of the country’s electricity demand growth by 2030. It is also expected that the US will end up using more electricity for data processing than for making major energy-heavy products like steel, aluminium, chemicals and cement. Electricity demand for data centers will reach 945 terawatt-hours by 2030 which is equivalent to Japan’s energy use right now.

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Google Uses Education Products to Track Online Activity of Students and Steal Personal Data

Android maker Google was recently accused of harming the youth by secretly making use of education products to track them.

A new lawsuit filed by concerned parents speaks about how the tech giant is making use of education products deployed at schools to highlight every student on an individual basis. They can track all online activity, including websites they visit and any links they click, using that to steal personal information.

The matter is an alarming one because nearly 70% of all American schools make use of Google Workspace inside classrooms. The latest review by a media organization shared several Bay Area School districts utilizing the exact same software.

Google embeds this tracking tech that is disguised to follow the whereabouts of the kids online. This gives rise to a new fingerprint unique to every student, as shared in the legal case. The legal case goes on to speak about how Google is harming the youth by invading privacy and making personal information vulnerable to criminals. They don’t compensate them for any of this, nor do their parents know who collects the data and where it goes.

Google was similarly accused of violating state laws related to wiretapping and privacy. This is why plaintiffs want compensation from the company for damages linked to this unauthorized student-information collection.

The latest fingerprint enables the Android maker and more to highlight individual phones and specific people. The company can, in this manner, track kids, no matter where they might be and where they’re traveling to.

The company has previously been accused of similar behavior in the past. In 2019, the tech giant paid out damages worth $170 million to settle all the claims made by the FTC. This had to do with unlawfully getting personal data from the youth who use YouTube.

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As per the lawsuit, Google is transforming troves of information from millions into very intricate student profiles. It then uses them to market goods and services to schools and gives rise to economic value. All stolen data, including information about kids below 13, exceeds what is needed for kids to take part in that activity facilitated through Google’s products. The fact that kids cannot opt out of using these products makes it all the worse.

Since then, Google has released a statement on this front but refuted the allegations. It did, however, agree to data collection from educational products.

Image: DIW-Aigen

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AI Nation Divided — Experts See Promise, Public Sees Peril

Pew Research Center conducted surveys of US adults and AI experts in 2024 to find out how the opinions of these two types of people differ when it comes to AI. The survey revealed that even though there are differences of opinions between the American public and AI experts, there are some common grounds as well. AI experts are more positive about AI usage when it comes to jobs, but both groups agree that there should be more control over how AI affects our lives. It was also found that men (53%) are more optimistic about AI usage than women (30%).

The survey found that AI experts are more optimistic about AI usage than the public, with 56% of the experts saying that AI is going to have a positive effect in the US as compared to 17% of the public. 47% of the experts said that they are more excited than concerned about the use of AI in daily life, while only 11% of the public feels the same. On the other hand, 51% of the American public said that they are more concerned than excited about using AI in daily lives, as compared to 15% of AI experts who said so.

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76% of the experts believe that AI is going to give them a lot of benefits, while 15% think that it is going to cause harm. On the other hand, 24% of the public thinks that AI is going to benefit them personally as compared to 43% who think AI is going to cause them harm. When it comes to using AI in a professional setting, 73% of experts and 23% of the public believe that AI is going to improve how people do their jobs over the next 20 years. There are also big differences in opinions between AI experts and the public when it comes to their thoughts about AI’s impacts on healthcare, the economy, art, and education

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Both the AI experts and the American public have doubts when it comes to AI’s usage in elections and news, with only one in ten people in both groups thinking that AI will positively impact elections. Both of the groups also want more regulations and personal control over AI, with 55% of the US adults and 57% of the AI experts wanting control over AI in their lives.

There are also differences among how people view AI according to their genders, with 22% of US men thinking AI will positively impact the US as compared to 12% of women. Among AI experts, this gap is even bigger with 63% of male experts saying AI will positively impact the US as compared to 36% of female experts. 81% of men think that AI will personally benefit them as compared to 64% of women. 60% of the people who are in academia say that they aren't confident that US companies will develop AI responsibly, while 39% of experts working in private companies also think the same.

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When it comes to AI and jobs, there is a difference in opinion between AI experts and the public, with 64% of US adults thinking that AI will lead to less jobs over the next 20 years, while only 39% of AI experts think so. Both of the groups agree that specific jobs are more at risk and around 75% of people from both groups think that jobs like cashier, software, and journalists are going to be negatively impacted by AI. 62% of AI experts also believe that truck drivers are also going to get fewer jobs as compared to 33% of the public who thinks the same. The Public also said that there are going to be less jobs for occupations like teachers, musicians, and adults because of AI but experts do not have such expectations.

The survey also asked people what concerns they have about AI and 56% of the public said that they are very concerned about AI causing job loss while 25% of the experts felt the same. 66% of the public and 70% of experts are concerned about AI spreading inaccurate information, 55% from both groups are concerned about bias in AI decisions and both of these groups are also concerned about data misuse and impersonation by AI. 57% of the public and 37% of experts are worried about loss of human connection because of AI and issues like bias and discrimination in AI are a big concern for both groups.

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75% of experts think that White views are considered more in AI while 50% think that views of Asian adults are also considered well, but Black and Hispanic perspectives aren't viewed well. 40% of the public thinks that White views are well-represented as compared to 25% who think Asian, Hispanic, and Black views are considered by AI. 60% of both groups are concerned that there is only little regulation of AI, and 62% of the public and 53% of experts aren't confident that government can regulate AI properly.

Take a look at these charts for more insights: 

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World