Google adds Personal Intelligence to Gemini (with your data)

The Gemini app gets Personal Intelligence and can therefore use data that Google already has about you to personalize responses.

Personal Intelligence in Google Gemini

Google wants to Gemini create a personal, proactive and powerful assistant and therefore adds ‘Personal Intelligence’. This allows Gemini to use your data that is already known to Google to make responses more personal.

Personal Intelligence can extract specific details from text, photos, or videos from your Google apps to customize Gemini’s responses. This includes:

• Google Workspace: including Gmail, Calendar, Drive, etc.
• Google Photos
• YouTube: viewing history
• Search services: including Search, Products, News and Maps

Thanks to Personal Intelligence, Gemini will provide unique, tailor-made answers. This goes a step further than consulting previous chats and is something the company has been working on since last year with the experimental Personalization model.

Gemini will provide a response that will point to the information it used from your connected sources so you can verify it. You can also correct Gemini at any time and you can regenerate answers without Personal Intelligence being enabled. There is also the option to use temporary chats.

Privacy

For privacy reasons, Personal Intelligence is disabled by default and you can select specific apps to connect. Google says Gemini doesn’t train directly on your Gmail inbox or Google Photos library, but on limited information like specific prompts.

Google goes on to say that a key differentiator is that this sensitive data is already stored securely with Google, so it doesn’t have to be sent somewhere to personalize your experience. As a precaution, Google will proactively avoid making assumptions about sensitive data, such as your health. Gemini will discuss this information with you if you request it.

Not yet perfect and in the Netherlands

Google does warn against inaccurate answers, where Personal Intelligence makes connections between unrelated topics. You can reject these answers. Specific challenges include timing and nuances. Particularly changes in relationships, such as divorces.

Personal Intelligence is available in the beta of Gemini, but for now only in the United States. We certainly expect the function to also come to the Netherlands, but it is not yet clear when. If you don’t want to miss anything, sign up for our newsletter!