More than 100 members of Congress have signed a letter urging Google and Spirit Airlines to halt a deal that would give Google access to internal Spirit data for $10 million. The data, intended for AI model training, includes roughly 100 million emails, 500 million Microsoft Teams messages, employment contracts, timecard records, and payroll and tax information.
Lawmakers, led by Rep. Steven Horsford and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, said they are not convinced that Google's plan to de-identify the data will protect employee privacy. They noted that removing direct identifiers such as names and email addresses does not necessarily make a dataset anonymous, especially in the context of modern AI.
The letter recommends that Google and Spirit create a de-identification process that incorporates feedback from former employees, exclude as much employee information as possible, set limits on data use, and conduct an independent employee confidentiality review. The context includes nearly 1,000 Spirit workers in Las Vegas who lost their jobs after the airline shut down in May.
Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and Spirit is defunct with no press contact available.