9 ms·

Can I opt out of my input or output data being used for training?

498 points by teekert 1mo ago

DanielHall 1mo ago
Just to achieve a great ideal: MEGA Make Europe Great Again.
teekert 1mo ago
Context: After careful research our organization preferred a European partner with good central privacy controls. We landed on Mistral, after being disappointed that the Pro tier was opt-in to training on prompts by default we switched up to the Team tier which provides an organization dashboard with some relevant settings. As we did that Mistral changed these options and the Team tier was now also opt-in by default and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization. This even caused some of our (testing) prompts to be used for training (which Mistral removed after we expressed our disappointment). For some time these pages conflicted with what our users reported (they said that in contrast to what I stated to our management they found they were opted into training on prompts by default as per their own privacy page). Mistral just now corrected their docs. I'm not sure how long the conflicting situation has lasted, but at least for several days. For contrast: Claude disables training on prompts for organizations starting from the 18 euro tier [0]. As a European I'm disappointed. [0] https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise
- summarity 1mo ago
  “Opt in by default” would mean that it is not enabled by default. Do you mean opt out?
  - teekert 1mo ago
    You are "opting in to sharing your prompts for training", by default in this case. My slider says: "Allow the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models.", it is on by default for everyone on the Team plan, the admin can't centrally turn it off anymore, and any user can toggle it when they want to. This all changed last week. I know I'm naive but I expect that when I pay, this stuff is simply off, so I was already surprised by the Pro plan. But I did look out for it there, because Anthropic made this switch some time ago.
    - KPGv2 1mo ago
      > You are "opting in to sharing your prompts for training", by default in this case. The English term for that is "opt out" not "opt in." To opt is to choose. If something is on by default, you have not opted in. You were forced in, and turning it off means you must opt out. (I.e., choose to be out.) normally I wouldn't care about a mistake like this, except that opt in/out are very important concepts in software development and hacker culture. And it reversed the meaning of the original comment in a highly confusing, relevant way.
      - jrave 1mo ago
        as another non-native speaker, i think that while the person you're answering to didn't use the default way of expressing this in the english-speaking world, i did understand what they meant, i think they do know what opting means and i think the reasoning is this: when they say data collection is "opt in" by default they mean that by choosing to use a product, you are opting into your data being collected (at the same time). on the other hand, native speakers saying something is "opt out" describes the options or toggles one has available in the default case - when something is toggled "true", you (only) have the choice to toggle it of. so english speakers talk about the controls one has to CHANGE the status quo.
        kzrdude 1mo ago
        As another non-native speaker, I misunderstood what the person meant.
      - brendoelfrendo 1mo ago
        They said "opt in to training on prompts by default," which is coherent English and perfectly fine. The phrases "opt in" and "opt out" will always be contextual based on what is being opted, so it really falls to the reader to pay attention to that context. Please don't give English language advice as though you are an authority; there is not a rule of the English language that would make their usage unacceptable.
        1mo ago
  - kevincox 1mo ago
    Yes, I found this comment very hard to understand until I realised they were talking about it being opt-out with no setting to change it. (At first I thought it was opt-in by default, and the "by default" implies that there is a setting to change the opt-in/opt-out setting)
- lukan 1mo ago
  "For contrast: Claude disables training on prompts for organizations starting from the 18 euro tier " In theory also for individuals? At least I have that toggle to deactivate that. But how would I ever know if they actually respect that?
  - kccqzy 1mo ago
    If you don’t trust the company to keep their promise, don’t use their products.
    - RussianCow 1mo ago
      I don't trust any company with their word on anything. Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding.
      - nullsanity 1mo ago
        Why does that matter? Legally binding just means "slightly more expensive when we get caught"
      - tjwebbnorfolk 1mo ago
        > Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding. Laws are violated all the time. The graveyard is full of people who had the right-of-way at a crosswalk ...
      - lostlogin 1mo ago
        > Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding. Companies violate them all the time and massive leaks happen a lot. The punishments are trivial.
        rkangel 1mo ago
        GPDR fines in the EU are NOT trivial.
      - DarmokTanagra 1mo ago
- throwaway89201 1mo ago
  > and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization There is a toggle on https://admin.mistral.ai https://admin.mistral.ai that allows you to disable training for both Vibe and Console/API for your entire organisation. And I'm not on the enterprise plan. I've disabled training the first time I created an account, and it has remained that way. You story is also very confusing due to the wording around "opt-in by default" and "disappointed [about] opt-in to training" (most people would be disappointed about an opt-out) and probably conveys the wrong message to most people.
  - surcap526 1mo ago
    [dead]
  - teekert 1mo ago
    I don't have that toggle (but could indeed have sworn I saw it earlier). Sorry, I have always thought that "opting in" is, "opting for the presented option" and opting out is "opting out of it", so opting out [of sharing prompts for training] is choosing to not share, but apparently I was wrong my whole life. I'm not a native speaker, and I think most people here (in my country) would interpret this the way I do? Weird but TIL.
    - tedggh 1mo ago
      You said it correctly, there’s no confusion.
      - tedggh 1mo ago
        Downvoted for knowing how to read
    - Miraltar 1mo ago
      If you opt in it means that by default you're not in and you chose that option. So if you're now included in training by default, then it's an opt-out feature as in you can opt out of it.
- Exoristos 1mo ago
  > opt-in by default That's called opt-out.
  - globular-toast 1mo ago
    Yeah, it was confusing to read the parent before I realised they got the terms the wrong way around. To those wondering, "opt" means to choose. "Opt in by default" makes no sense because you didn't choose; this is just "in by default". If they give you an option then it's called opt out. Opt in would be "out by default" with the option to go in.
- Aldipower 1mo ago
  Today I registered a free account with Grok, because I simply was curious. Man, training is "off" by default even with the free tier. I was positively surprised. As a European I'm disappointed too.
  - _puk 1mo ago
    Lol, I'm fully expecting in 6 months time: "A bug in our portal had the setting for training inverted. This means that when you expected us not to be training on your data, we actually were. We know this adversely impacts the trust our users invested in us, so as of today we are crediting all affected accounts with $200 to use on our latest models".
    - Aldipower 1mo ago
      One can expect a lot what happens in 6 months. Maybe the earth will turn clockwise then! Think about it. :-D
      - artwr 1mo ago
        Lol. I would have thought it depended more on your relative position to the equator than on the season.
    - leonidasrup 1mo ago
      Until the risk of large financial penalties or long jail times is high enough, the CEOs of there companies operate using the "It's Better to Ask for Forgiveness Than Permission" model.
  - blazarquasar 1mo ago
    Grok has possibly the worst ToS of any of the AI providers. They are probably different in the EU, but: > In choosing to submit, create, generate, record, post, or display Inputs on or through the Service, you grant an irrevocable, perpetual, transferable, sublicensable, royalty-free, and worldwide right to SpaceXAI to use, copy, store, modify, process, adapt, transmit, distribute, reproduce, publish, upload, download, display in public forums, list information regarding, make derivative works of, and distribute such Content, including anything referenced therein, in any and all media or distribution methods now known or later developed, for any purpose, and to aggregate your User Content and derivative works thereof for any purpose, including but not limited to: (i) maintain and provide the Service; (ii) improve our products and the Service and for our other business purposes, such as data analysis, customer and market research, developing new products or features, or identifying or displaying usage or User Content trends; and (iii) perform such other actions to enforce these Terms, comply with our Privacy Policy, comply with applicable law or governmental, court, and law enforcement requests or requirements or keep our Service safe. > To the extent the User Content includes a person’s image, likeness, voice, or other similar attributes, you grant SpaceXAI the same rights to use those attributes as part of the User Content as described above. You represent and warrant that you have obtained all rights, licenses, notices, permissions, and consents necessary for SpaceXAI to use that User Content. https://x.ai/legal/terms-of-service https://x.ai/legal/terms-of-service
- kragen 1mo ago
  > being disappointed that the Pro tier was opt-in to training on prompts by default "Opt-in" means that the default is non-participation, for example, not training on your prompts. Is it possible that you intended to say "opt-out", which means that the default is participation? That's what the context seems to suggest. See, for example, https://termly.io/resources/articles/opt-in-vs-opt-out/ https://termly.io/resources/articles/opt-in-vs-opt-out/: > Data privacy laws like the GDPR and CCPA give individuals the right to opt in or out of different data processing activities. > · Opt in consent means the user takes an action to show they agree to something, > · Opt out consent is when they take an action to say no. Or https://bigid.com/blog/opt-in-vs-opt-out-consent/ https://bigid.com/blog/opt-in-vs-opt-out-consent/: > • Opt-in consent requires users to actively agree before data collection or processing. > • Opt-out consent allows data collection by default unless the user declines. This is an important distinction, because confusing the two (as you seem to be doing) can lead you both into unethical fraud and legal liability.
- surcap526 1mo ago
  [dead]
- semiquaver 1mo ago
  > opt-in by default Sorry to nitpick but the scheme you’re referring to is called “opt-out.”
- jacquesm 1mo ago
  I don't trust any of these companies with my data, and I assume that whatever data they've got is going to be used, one way or another, no matter what they tell you. It would be nice if you could stick a sentinel in your data that if it ever shows up in the models you know they've broken the rules for sure.
  - bluefirebrand 1mo ago
    Yeah. Unfortunately they know you can't catch them on this so they feel absolutely free to do whatever they please If such a data sentinel did exist then we might see them change their behavior
- rezonant 1mo ago
  Buried by the distraction of the semantics of "opt in" vs "opt out", the more interesting conflict isn't addressed in the sibling threads. > and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization vs > Vibe (Teams): Administrators can disable data training usage for the entire organization. Is the document out of date? Or did Mistral reinstate this ability after the fact? What's the story here? Others seem to be stating they have and have had the ability to opt out of training centrally for a long time. EDIT: Oh, it is addressed just a bit hard to find with all the opt in/out explanations: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549102 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549102
  - teekert 1mo ago
    You are right! They must have just now switched this back, I also have the toggle now! It was turned on sadly but it’s something.
- teekert 1mo ago
  Just now the sentence: “Vibe (Teams): Administrators can disable data training usage for the entire organization.” Was added to tfa. And I now see an org wide toggle where there was none before! Sadly it was on so I hope no users submitted stuff in the mean time, but it’s something!
floki165 1mo ago
[flagged]
- shujip 1mo ago
  Yes. If the privacy control only exists per user, it isn't a control for a team. Defaults matter more than the blog post. "You can opt out" is not the same product as "the org can actually enforce opt out."
- throwaway89201 1mo ago
  This isn't the case. There's a toggle on https://admin.mistral.ai https://admin.mistral.ai that allows you to disable training for both Vibe and Console/API for your entire organization, I just checked.
  - teekert 1mo ago
    I think they removed the toggle for new customers (on the Team plan) because I don’t have it. If I had, I probably wouldn’t have posted this. I mean it’s still annoying that I subscribe my org because they say the toggle is off, then find users telling me in fact it is on. Then to find that I can’t disable it org wide and have to ask each user to “please watch out” is pretty humiliating.
r_lee 1mo ago
European innovation right here you can't make this shit up
segmondy 1mo ago
There are so models that beats all of Mistral models, plus you can run many of them locally. Why would anyone run Mistral?
- KPGv2 1mo ago
  Possibly because Mistral is a French-based company, so EU companies can cut the American umbilical cord a bit more.
  - A_D_E_P_T 1mo ago
    EU companies can download GLM or Kimi-K3 and get way better performance, though? I don't see any case for using a Mistral model when much better open models exist.
    - brendoelfrendo 1mo ago
      Because not everyone has the infrastructure to run that with better performance? Anyway, Mistral serves GLM 5.2 through their global and European endpoints, so if you wanted to leverage their services and use a more powerful open model, that seems to be an option.
    - KPGv2 1mo ago
      Most people don't want a second job trying to figure out self-hosted AI stuff.
- jnurmine 1mo ago
  To be honest, I have a hard time noticing differences with Claude (in Kiro) and Mistral Vibe, at least with what I use them for. They simply feel like talking to the exact same thing.
- perks_12 1mo ago
  The OCR stuff is quite usable. Their models perform good at some very basic tasks, so I use them to diversify. But their current model lineup is really terrible.
maxdo 1mo ago
It’s a spyware, but a sovereign one
- zoobab 1mo ago
  What do you expect from running on "someone else computer?"
  - r_lee 1mo ago
    a service provided to you for the money you paid? just like with any other business?
    - pixl97 1mo ago
      Sheet, that is so 20th century. All the other businesses have been bought up by VC, going to rental models, and looking for new and interesting ways to screw you over too.
- kieranmaine 1mo ago
  How so? I've opted out of using my data for training.
  - teekert 1mo ago
    Defaults matter. The expectation for an organization tier plan is not that you have to go and ask each user in your org to please turn off "Allow the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models" before starting your work.
  - pixl97 1mo ago
    How many times with large companies have you found that they removed the old opt-out value and put a new one in that is enabled by default because of course it's opt-out? Opt-out doesn't mean dick when the regulatory environment allows them to do things like the above without any recourse. Of course you can go to any other company that follows the exact same rules if you'd like.
DerDerDaIst 1mo ago
Oh come on. So you should be fine with this because "hey we're the friendly europeans..."?
ex1fm3ta 1mo ago
I mean they all do it right ? Mistral is just the first one to publicly say it.
f6v 1mo ago
Same company that has a partnership with Saudis, btw.
- icantevenhold 1mo ago
  This means exactly what? I think you would be hard pressed to find any relevant tech company that doesn’t have a relationship with the Saudis or is funded by them - or any government for that matter…
  - f6v 1mo ago
    Yeah, let's just sweep it under the rug then!
    - icantevenhold 1mo ago
      Nah but be a little bit more specific than just sprinkling random FUD - what is the relationship and why is it problematic ?
maz1b 1mo ago
I could be mistaken, but wasn't Mistral openly championing themselves as a company and EU option that wouldn't do this/didn't do this?
- whizzter 1mo ago
  Maybe they realized that they were falling behind too much? To me it seems like user-feedback on bad descisions by the AI once it's trained to a basic level is among the most important signals in tuning the model to perform better.
  - danelski 1mo ago
    That's what I believe. Once you have scanned every passive source available, using the user conversations to e.g. find common paths to a solution and shortcut them would seem natural.
    - whizzter 1mo ago
      Paths and shortcuts isn't the most important part here I think, rather negative signals about unfitting choices is more important, do we use algorithm/library/etc XYZ in this situation or not, the developers using it would provide the context suitability of options on a more finegrained level than resulting (semi-)public artifacts provide.
- mhitza 1mo ago
  You must have not been keeping up with the times :) Their big play this year was to write a "whitepaper" on the future state of EU economy, which is something that they'd like to hand of to EU leaders and part of that proposal was some kind of mandatory 10% sovereign AI spend, or some other nonsense like that. They are, at least, trying to make big enterprise (with tailored models, custom integration) and government policy plays. That just goes to show you how ineffective they are as well at making AI click as a usecase. And when they don't get ahead by their own terms they copy what they see ongoing with US AI labs. Le Chat, and Vibe.
Diti 1mo ago
This gets posted literally moments before I was about to pay them after ditching Claude. Thank you! I hate data collection in paid products. I think I will be using Kagi Ultimate for the inference UI, so the data is somewhat anonymized before being collected.
- throwaway89201 1mo ago
  I'm really hoping Mistral will succeed with their open models, so I'm a bit biased, but I don't have any affiliation. This submit is a bit of well-meaning but confused scaremongering however. Mistral has had, and continues to have, a toggle in the admin settings that permanently disables training on your data. The option has not been removed, and previous opt-outs are still honored. As far as I know, Mistral always trained on your data by default except for the enterprise plan, with the option to disable it on all plans, and with the option for organizations to make the choice for all your users. Kagi Ultimate still uses mostly closed models by OpenAI / Anthropic, etc.
  - teekert 1mo ago
    There is no toggle in my admin settings to disable this for the whole org (when on the Team plan). If it was there before they recently removed it. "Mistral always trained on your data by default except for the enterprise plan" - This is not true, until last week all docs stated that the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models was off by default on the Team plan. Now that is only still the case on the enterprise plan.
- evanjrowley 1mo ago
  My best experience with Mistral has been with their expensive GLM-5.2 model. It's actually developed by Z.ai, but unlike Z.ai, the GLM-5.2 at Mistral can be used at a low price without training on your prompts - but only if you remember to hit the privacy toggle in their admin settings. Planning code changes with GLM-5.2 using a Mistral Studio API key and implementing code changes using the Mistral Vibe API key has worked well for me. At my basic subscription tier, Vibe will share data with Mistral. It works for me because, when it comes to privacy, I care less about the actual code and more about the planning / high-level stuff.
perks_12 1mo ago
I assume they do this no before releasing new models. It feels like they expect higher user influx from their new models.
saaaaaam 1mo ago
This is a hugely misleading editorialised title. The page title is "Can I opt out of my input or output data being used for training". Right at the top of the page it says "In certain cases, your input and output data (such as conversations, documents, and other user-provided content) may be included in Mistral’s model training programs. You retain full control over this processing and have the right to opt out of these programs at any time."
- heaney-555 1mo ago
  This is the case for all the major AI providers. Training collection is on by default, but you can opt out.
  - teekert 1mo ago
    "No model training on your content by default" [0] It's not the default on any Team plans and didn't used to be at Mistral (until last week or so). The team plan has a central admin role and page, and "seats". And if it was the default, then I'd still expect a big button to turn it off for all seats, and not have to ask all user separately. But this changed over night and that button is not there. Although I expect it used to be, because some people here report that they have it. https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise
- kieranmaine 1mo ago
  Agreed. I read the title as they would start using my data for training and I couldn't opt-out. After looking at the page and checking my app (I have Pro subscription) it seems like I can opt-out and my initial opt-out when I subscribed was preserved.
  - teekert 1mo ago
    When I started my search for an AI "partner" the Mistral TEAM plan had "use my prompts for training" turned off by default, as per their docs in multiple places. I could have sworn I saw a organization switch in my dashboard for this setting org wide, but am not sure. I start the subscription, users report it is "on" by default, I ask support what's up, they say "sorry, docs should have been updated earlier but they are now". And they give me a lot of credits. I just want to warn people, the Team sub just changed, docs were update too late, there was very little press about this (in my view) very important change. Actually, it is so important that I would not advice Mistral to our management if they'd use our prompts for training, so I take a TEAM sub so this is disabled for sure, or I can disable this org wide. But I can't anymore, now I have to ask each user/seat to disable sharing, and hope they do, I have no way to check. Way to inspire confidence. And their response: "You can still do this with the Enterprise subscription". We flamed Anthropic for their switcheroo with their personal Pro plan a year ago [0], now Mistral does it with their business focused Team plan, so they deserve some fire imo. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45076274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45076274
krunck 1mo ago
Very disappointing. I really get the sense that all AI companies and anti-privacy parasites on society.
danelski 1mo ago
Most commenters here clutching their pearls as if Claude and Gemini Pro didn't do it already. In the latter you (as a paying customer) can't even store the chat history unless you agree to their 'improvement of services'. Do you have all your accounts paid for by the enterprise or you never check the settings?
- rdm_blackhole 1mo ago
  > Most commenters here clutching their pearls as if Claude and Gemini Pro didn't do it already. That's not the point though. The problem is that in the minds of lots of people including here on HN or otherwise, a service based in the EU is de-facto "more" respectful of digital privacy. You can read the comments on threads related to the EU tech where you will find people defending to the very end that privacy is better in the EU and that EU providers will never stoop as low as their US counterparts. As always the truth is a lot murkier than that. Yes, some services based in the EU are better in terms of privacy but it's not a given for all of them and it depends entirely on the service. Unfortunately such a nuanced take is not wildly popular in the tech world in this day and age where every US company is labelled as an evil data hungry entity and EU companies are portrayed as saints in this regard. That's where the first problem lies. The second problem is that for years now, people have been singing the praises of Mistral as a privacy friendly alternative the the US juggernauts because Mistral's headquarters is located in the EU and unfortunately today it seems some people are waking up to the fact that Mistral is doing the same thing than its US counterparts and they are disappointed which is understandable. Who is to blame for this dichotomy? Is it Mistral who leaned too much on this marketing angle (the European Chatgpt without the invasive tracking/ better privacy settings) or is it the users who failed to realize that EU or not, Mistral wasn't going to pass on the opportunity to improve its models this way? My hunch is that it's both.
  - icantevenhold 1mo ago
    No one is saying that every US company is an evil data hungry entity and EU companies are saints. But fact of the matter is that the US is rapidly sliding into totalitarianism and at the same time US tech companies have an hu huge influence worldwide. I commend any alternative that comes from outside the US and also offers an “open source” selfhosted option.
vb-8448 1mo ago
My bet is that mistral models will suddenly start to shine.
chris_explicare 1mo ago
[dead]
matthieu_bl 1mo ago
Summary of the different scenarios Service: Vibe Plan: Non-Enterprise Default: Opted in Opt-out possible? Yes Service: Vibe Plan: Enterprise Default: Opted out Opt-out possible? Yes (admin-managed) Service: Mistral Studio/API Plan: Not specified Default: Not stated, I assume opted in Opt-out possible? Yes
ylisav 1mo ago
Very disappointing, but who doesn't train on user data? It's the only moat they have
- mhitza 1mo ago
  I had the option, and had it disable everywhere, manually. The only one I didn't use, at all, is Anthropics service because of iffy Dario aura and their terms of service. Where is training in user data enforced and not possible to opt out?
romanovcode 1mo ago
I'm sure that the 3 users they have are very pissed about this news.
htrp 1mo ago
LeChat when it was launched as a consumer product was always going to be a data acquisition play. This is them just making it very clear and disclosing as per European rules.
gkbrk 1mo ago
[dead]
lukeschlather 1mo ago
I'd be interested in some legal/GDPR takes on PII handling in prompts. If someone enters PII into a prompt, and Mistral retains it for training, is it sufficient for them to say "don't enter PII into prompts?" Of course with Claude and so on this bothers me too, but it doesn't seem like there's any real recourse under US law. But I would hope that "oh you shouldn't enter PII" isn't going to cut it under European law, that if I say "don't store my prompts, they include PII I don't want you storing" should be sufficient here under the GDPR and Mistral shouldn't be able to just store it anyway.
- TZubiri 1mo ago
  They might circumvent this by adding a prompt like "remove PII from this prompt", so I don't think it's a worthwhile route. The issue exists whether PII is input or not, like IP or secrets.
asyncze 1mo ago
[dead]
xyst 1mo ago
the rapid enshittification in LLM hype cycle is something else. Got to love the private equity parasites ruining everything for the sake of profit.
- senordevnyc 1mo ago
  I didn’t realize Mistral was owned by private equity.
LoveMistral 1mo ago
They wouldn’t dare train on language inputs from the wild, but they will happily strip out any code snippets you’re providing and sell/train on that à la GitHub/Copilot. File uploads too
- TZubiri 1mo ago
  What? They dared train on random websites like reddit, training on language inputs from the wild is the name of the game
  - ycCantCode 1mo ago
    [dead]
TZubiri 1mo ago
i don't get the legal aspect of this if you sign the contract (click I agree on Terms of Service), and it says that they do not train on the data, by what right can they backtrack on that? Maybe it is assumed that they notified you and you have the right to terminate the contract? Relying on some clause where the contract can be updated at any time. Or terminated at any time (with the presumption that a clause change is a termination and an automatic signing of the new contract, but that's weak)
- teekert 1mo ago
  I think it only goes for new users/orgs. I was caught between the time they changed the default and updated their docs. I don't believe they would alter users/organizations exiting choices. In facts, from some of the responses it seems that some still retain the toggle to opt out their entire org.
ycCantCode 1mo ago
[dead]
rectang 1mo ago
I pay for a subscription to Duck.ai mainly because I don't want to be constantly fighting my vendor to protect my privacy. Microsoft already did a rug pull on me and opted me in to training months after I signed up with Github Copilot. It exhausting and ultimately futile to monitor these companies. It's not guaranteed that Duck.ai will continue to uphold its promise of not training on your sessions — if the company gets bought by Microsoft, it's only a matter of time before the switch to "you can opt out at any time". But since privacy is Duck.ai's brand, it will be somewhat harder for them to hide what they're doing should they betray their customers. I also don't actually trust that Duck.ai sub-vendors OpenAI and Anthropic will uphold whatever contract they have with Duck.ai — the whole AI business model is built on lawless consumption of others work. We'll ultimately have to run our own models locally, because it's impractical to defend against untrustworthy AI vendors.
- nozzlegear 1mo ago
  I also pay for duck.ai's service. They're my main "chat bot" thing, and while I had already been paying for their other services when I discovered I also had a duck.ai subscription, I choose to use them primarily because privacy is their whole brand. I only have two minor complainst: I want my conversations to sync between mobile and desktop (while being E2E), and I want a way to organize conversations into "projects" or grouped chats.
  - samename 1mo ago
    Have you tried Lumo by Proton? It is E2EE and has projects. A bit more expensive than duck.ai but I found the model to be good enough
    - forabi 1mo ago
      How could a cloud LLM be E2EE?
      - lukewarm707 1mo ago
        it isn't.
EFLKumo 1mo ago
Come on, think how fast Grok evolves after SoaceXAI acquired Cursor. I just believe if you can't get enough real data from practice then you can't train a good model. And for Mistral collecting data is a must step no matter what approach it takes.
tensor 1mo ago
I just checked my admin dashboard and training on my data is (still?) off. Maybe I already set it to off when I signed up, I don't really remember.
- teekert 1mo ago
  They don’t switch it for you probably, that would be very bad. But the default for new users and orgs on the Team plan just changed. But they didn’t update the docs for a while which left me confused as I started my subscription after they switched but before they updated their docs.
zelphirkalt 1mo ago
I remember this being the default for a while already. When I signed up and got an API key, I remember I did turn off the training option specifically, so it must have already been a default to have training on input on.
- teekert 1mo ago
  This is about the Team plan specifically, which was like enterprise before. And it’s about the removal of the option to disable training on user input for all users from said plan at the org level, all last week.
creativeSlumber 1mo ago
> Vibe: users are not opted out by default > Vibe (Enterprise): customers are opted out of training by default So they made it opt in for enterprise (how it should be), but intentionally made opt out for regular user.Basically saying "screw you: to regular users. Any self respecting user should stop using them.
moffkalast 1mo ago
I'd send them a GDPR request, if I had an reason to use their fifth rate cloud models.
bigbuppo 1mo ago
Great news if you want your LLM to be horny, I guess.
scotty79 1mo ago
I wonder how much the progress is slowed down just because most companies don't train on consumer convos. Assuming they really don't.
threecheese 1mo ago
Realistically, what are the risks? I get not wanting info you provide to AI being used against you in the future, like if you are gay and move to a country where that’s illegal (or live in one where it becomes illegal), but is “training” an actual risk here? I would assume that PII is redacted, and so beyond redaction failure, the real risk here seems to be to intellectual property and not to personal privacy. Edit: Does “use for training” include “we store all your chat logs forever tied to your identity”?
- LtWorf 1mo ago
  Seems in USA you can go to jail for going somewhere else to legally have an abortion. So for example that.
- randomblock1 1mo ago
  The retain it for "the duration necessary to achieve the intended purposes", which could mean forever.
dang 1mo ago
Submitted title was "Mistral now trains on user input by default, except on enterprise tier". THat's good information (if true) but best suited to a comment in the thread rather than the title (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22level%20playing%20field%22%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...). We've changed it to the article title now per https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
20k 1mo ago
You have to be rather naive if you don't think these companies don't simply train on your prompts with or without your consent. They literally scrape everything - legal or not - and claim its fair use to train on, including straight piracy The idea that they'll steal from everyone except you is just wishful thinking
- WarmWash 1mo ago
  It would be catastrohic for any of the big labs if it came out that they were training on what was sold as private. I get this cynical conspiratorial energy, it fits the internet well, but I can assure you most people with even mild business sense would be intensely opposed to this idea. Well, except maybe Zuckerburg, but they don't really do enterprise anyway.
  - r_lee 1mo ago
    exactly, I don't understand how HN doesn't understand this by this logic every business contract in tech is just a bunch of lies and means nothing and the only way to do anything is to have a server sitting next to you, otherwise it's "someone else's computer"
    - 20k 1mo ago
      I mean, they've already violated the law in acquiring all their training data already, why would they be uncomfortable violating a contract to get more training data?
      - vineyardmike 1mo ago
        Because violating the law was the prerequisite to starting their business, without it they're worth $0 and have no models. They've already survived Training on customer input may help the models but it isn't "bet the farm" helpful. Now, they have a thriving business, so they shouldn't risk their business for incremental data that they can buy. At this point, the reputation of the business matters too. Fable explicitly didn't support zero-retention usage, and it saw significantly lower adoption vs other flagship models, and their past releases. Being caught abusing enterprise contracts is really hard to dig out of.
olejorgenb 1mo ago
> In the Admin panel[links to the admin panel], open the Privacy menu in the left-hand navigation bar. Why not link to the https://admin.mistral.ai/plateforme/privacy https://admin.mistral.ai/plateforme/privacy panel directly
luciana1u 1mo ago
[flagged]
Lucasoato 1mo ago
Question: when AI companies say they don’t train on your input or output, do they mean that they don’t train on an extremely simple AI rework of your input or output as well?
- j4k0bfr 1mo ago
  Damn, that's an interesting point. Having a model transform your work into 'independent' IP and then training on that. I would assume any actual trade secrets (e.g. recipes, financial info) are protected but... tech companies have bent the law before. I'm assuming they've all at least thought about it quite hard, which is worrying in-and-of itself :).
thoughtpeddler 1mo ago
For all the people here alleging that AI companies will train on your data even when you as a user explicitly opt out of training and their terms say they will respect that, etc - do you also believe that within a few years of them having harvested your data, you could perform "knowledge probing" on their models by prompting various questions that determine if they can near-verbatim reproduce your unique data, and then have enough other people do the same that you can then just launch a class-action lawsuit? Because if not... I've got a startup idea for you.
croes 1mo ago
> users are not opted out by default Of course because you can’t be opt out by default that would be called opt in.
__MatrixMan__ 1mo ago
I'd like to provide extra context to help with training. Like, here's my codebase and the logs and the docs, feel free to ask me questions about it... Whatever makes the next version more applicable to the problems I'm trying to solve would be excellent. I just wish I could force them to share it with their competitors also.
sbinnee 1mo ago
I remember mistral provides some free credits for opting in data for training. And for some reason I could not find this option anywhere in my console. Does someone know if this plan still exists?
_blackhawk_ 1mo ago
ZDR on OpenRouter + Aperture by Tailscale. And you should be good with the right config
deleted 1mo ago
[deleted]
luciana1u 1mo ago
[flagged]
munksbeer 1mo ago
I can understand companies not wanting to leak sensitive data or information, so not wanting their inputs used for training. But the individual level moral perspective confuses me. You object to your own input being used for training "for free", but you're ok to use models which already slurped the data of millions of other people "for free"? I don't get it. Obviously this is going to be a controversial take on here (I am not blind to the sentiment), so, please help me understand. If you're a conscientious objector, why are you using the models in the first place?
- greggoB 1mo ago
  Private users also have sensitive information which, if leaked, could be used to their detriment (e.g training data getting hacked, etc). I don't see any distinction between companies and people when it comes to moral objections re training data - at least, if that's a thing, I'm unaware of it. I do agree with your last point re the hypocrisy.
- dsign 1mo ago
  There's something to this argument. I for one use an API proxy (Kagi Assistant) when I'm submitting anything remotely sensitive to an LLM. But for coding in my hobby project, I have marked "use my conversations for training" in the Claude app. I do it in the off chance that one day we will use stupid amounts of compute for personalized medicine and to fight cancer; code for scientific and technical computing is really complicated and only a tiny fraction of humans can produce it.
  - munksbeer 1mo ago
    If I understand your comment correctly (and highly likely I missed something), I am very similar. Using stuff at work the AI team tries their best to ensure we don't leak our internal data or code. But for my personal use, I'm totally fine with helping train the models. I'll be called naive, but I'm on the optimist side of the fence here. I hope, and expect, AI actually frees us up and delivers much improved lives for everyone. I know this goes against the current zeitgeist, but it is genuinely what I think will happen rather than the dystopia most people predict.
beyondscale-yes 1mo ago
[dead]
amelius 1mo ago
Can we have a unicode character that means "don't use for AI training", and another one for "this is AI generated data", and while we're at it one for "don't use for advertising purposes".
alescalaios 1mo ago
[flagged]
greenjudge 1mo ago
[flagged]
daRealDodo 1mo ago
You can check-out any time, but you can never leave.
xtiansimon 1mo ago
Ha! I was researching local llm’s training yesterday—I _want this_ for my local llm project.
Noaidi 1mo ago
No one will read this but AI probably. I am done with contributing to AI. I never used AI but even posting here I am contributing to it as AI is known to scrape HN. https://alterlab.io/blog/how-to-give-your-ai-agent-access-to-hacker-news-data https://alterlab.io/blog/how-to-give-your-ai-agent-access-to... So no more data for them. No more social media, no more cloud storage, just no more. It's been fun, but I am smarter than AI, so bye.
selicos 1mo ago
Run local or expect some data to be used for development. These companies did not create these tools by paying fair market value for the content.
rezonant 1mo ago
Can anyone shed light on why there's a button for copying specifically for LLMs ("Copy for LLM") and why there's also an "Open in Claude" option on these articles? Regarding the former, there's no normal Copy button so presumably this just copies the content of the article. Not sure why it needs to be clarified that its for LLMs.
camerondennis 25d ago
[dead]
mjprintz 28d ago
[dead]

498 points by teekert 1mo ago

Just to achieve a great ideal: MEGA Make Europe Great Again.

Context: After careful research our organization preferred a European partner with good central privacy controls. We landed on Mistral, after being disappointed that the Pro tier was opt-in to training on prompts by default we switched up to the Team tier which provides an organization dashboard with some relevant settings. As we did that Mistral changed these options and the Team tier was now also opt-in by default and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization. This even caused some of our (testing) prompts to be used for training (which Mistral removed after we expressed our disappointment). For some time these pages conflicted with what our users reported (they said that in contrast to what I stated to our management they found they were opted into training on prompts by default as per their own privacy page). Mistral just now corrected their docs. I'm not sure how long the conflicting situation has lasted, but at least for several days. For contrast: Claude disables training on prompts for organizations starting from the 18 euro tier [0]. As a European I'm disappointed. [0] https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise

summarity 1mo ago
“Opt in by default” would mean that it is not enabled by default. Do you mean opt out?
- teekert 1mo ago
  You are "opting in to sharing your prompts for training", by default in this case. My slider says: "Allow the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models.", it is on by default for everyone on the Team plan, the admin can't centrally turn it off anymore, and any user can toggle it when they want to. This all changed last week. I know I'm naive but I expect that when I pay, this stuff is simply off, so I was already surprised by the Pro plan. But I did look out for it there, because Anthropic made this switch some time ago.
  - KPGv2 1mo ago
    > You are "opting in to sharing your prompts for training", by default in this case. The English term for that is "opt out" not "opt in." To opt is to choose. If something is on by default, you have not opted in. You were forced in, and turning it off means you must opt out. (I.e., choose to be out.) normally I wouldn't care about a mistake like this, except that opt in/out are very important concepts in software development and hacker culture. And it reversed the meaning of the original comment in a highly confusing, relevant way.
    - jrave 1mo ago
      as another non-native speaker, i think that while the person you're answering to didn't use the default way of expressing this in the english-speaking world, i did understand what they meant, i think they do know what opting means and i think the reasoning is this: when they say data collection is "opt in" by default they mean that by choosing to use a product, you are opting into your data being collected (at the same time). on the other hand, native speakers saying something is "opt out" describes the options or toggles one has available in the default case - when something is toggled "true", you (only) have the choice to toggle it of. so english speakers talk about the controls one has to CHANGE the status quo.
      - kzrdude 1mo ago
        As another non-native speaker, I misunderstood what the person meant.
    - brendoelfrendo 1mo ago
      They said "opt in to training on prompts by default," which is coherent English and perfectly fine. The phrases "opt in" and "opt out" will always be contextual based on what is being opted, so it really falls to the reader to pay attention to that context. Please don't give English language advice as though you are an authority; there is not a rule of the English language that would make their usage unacceptable.
      - 1mo ago
- kevincox 1mo ago
  Yes, I found this comment very hard to understand until I realised they were talking about it being opt-out with no setting to change it. (At first I thought it was opt-in by default, and the "by default" implies that there is a setting to change the opt-in/opt-out setting)
lukan 1mo ago
"For contrast: Claude disables training on prompts for organizations starting from the 18 euro tier " In theory also for individuals? At least I have that toggle to deactivate that. But how would I ever know if they actually respect that?
- kccqzy 1mo ago
  If you don’t trust the company to keep their promise, don’t use their products.
  - RussianCow 1mo ago
    I don't trust any company with their word on anything. Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding.
    - nullsanity 1mo ago
      Why does that matter? Legally binding just means "slightly more expensive when we get caught"
    - tjwebbnorfolk 1mo ago
      > Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding. Laws are violated all the time. The graveyard is full of people who had the right-of-way at a crosswalk ...
    - lostlogin 1mo ago
      > Luckily, privacy policies are legally binding. Companies violate them all the time and massive leaks happen a lot. The punishments are trivial.
      - rkangel 1mo ago
        GPDR fines in the EU are NOT trivial.
    - DarmokTanagra 1mo ago
throwaway89201 1mo ago
> and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization There is a toggle on https://admin.mistral.ai https://admin.mistral.ai that allows you to disable training for both Vibe and Console/API for your entire organisation. And I'm not on the enterprise plan. I've disabled training the first time I created an account, and it has remained that way. You story is also very confusing due to the wording around "opt-in by default" and "disappointed [about] opt-in to training" (most people would be disappointed about an opt-out) and probably conveys the wrong message to most people.
- surcap526 1mo ago
  [dead]
- teekert 1mo ago
  I don't have that toggle (but could indeed have sworn I saw it earlier). Sorry, I have always thought that "opting in" is, "opting for the presented option" and opting out is "opting out of it", so opting out [of sharing prompts for training] is choosing to not share, but apparently I was wrong my whole life. I'm not a native speaker, and I think most people here (in my country) would interpret this the way I do? Weird but TIL.
  - tedggh 1mo ago
    You said it correctly, there’s no confusion.
    - tedggh 1mo ago
      Downvoted for knowing how to read
  - Miraltar 1mo ago
    If you opt in it means that by default you're not in and you chose that option. So if you're now included in training by default, then it's an opt-out feature as in you can opt out of it.
Exoristos 1mo ago
> opt-in by default That's called opt-out.
- globular-toast 1mo ago
  Yeah, it was confusing to read the parent before I realised they got the terms the wrong way around. To those wondering, "opt" means to choose. "Opt in by default" makes no sense because you didn't choose; this is just "in by default". If they give you an option then it's called opt out. Opt in would be "out by default" with the option to go in.
Aldipower 1mo ago
Today I registered a free account with Grok, because I simply was curious. Man, training is "off" by default even with the free tier. I was positively surprised. As a European I'm disappointed too.
- _puk 1mo ago
  Lol, I'm fully expecting in 6 months time: "A bug in our portal had the setting for training inverted. This means that when you expected us not to be training on your data, we actually were. We know this adversely impacts the trust our users invested in us, so as of today we are crediting all affected accounts with $200 to use on our latest models".
  - Aldipower 1mo ago
    One can expect a lot what happens in 6 months. Maybe the earth will turn clockwise then! Think about it. :-D
    - artwr 1mo ago
      Lol. I would have thought it depended more on your relative position to the equator than on the season.
  - leonidasrup 1mo ago
    Until the risk of large financial penalties or long jail times is high enough, the CEOs of there companies operate using the "It's Better to Ask for Forgiveness Than Permission" model.
- blazarquasar 1mo ago
  Grok has possibly the worst ToS of any of the AI providers. They are probably different in the EU, but: > In choosing to submit, create, generate, record, post, or display Inputs on or through the Service, you grant an irrevocable, perpetual, transferable, sublicensable, royalty-free, and worldwide right to SpaceXAI to use, copy, store, modify, process, adapt, transmit, distribute, reproduce, publish, upload, download, display in public forums, list information regarding, make derivative works of, and distribute such Content, including anything referenced therein, in any and all media or distribution methods now known or later developed, for any purpose, and to aggregate your User Content and derivative works thereof for any purpose, including but not limited to: (i) maintain and provide the Service; (ii) improve our products and the Service and for our other business purposes, such as data analysis, customer and market research, developing new products or features, or identifying or displaying usage or User Content trends; and (iii) perform such other actions to enforce these Terms, comply with our Privacy Policy, comply with applicable law or governmental, court, and law enforcement requests or requirements or keep our Service safe. > To the extent the User Content includes a person’s image, likeness, voice, or other similar attributes, you grant SpaceXAI the same rights to use those attributes as part of the User Content as described above. You represent and warrant that you have obtained all rights, licenses, notices, permissions, and consents necessary for SpaceXAI to use that User Content. https://x.ai/legal/terms-of-service https://x.ai/legal/terms-of-service
kragen 1mo ago
> being disappointed that the Pro tier was opt-in to training on prompts by default "Opt-in" means that the default is non-participation, for example, not training on your prompts. Is it possible that you intended to say "opt-out", which means that the default is participation? That's what the context seems to suggest. See, for example, https://termly.io/resources/articles/opt-in-vs-opt-out/ https://termly.io/resources/articles/opt-in-vs-opt-out/: > Data privacy laws like the GDPR and CCPA give individuals the right to opt in or out of different data processing activities. > · Opt in consent means the user takes an action to show they agree to something, > · Opt out consent is when they take an action to say no. Or https://bigid.com/blog/opt-in-vs-opt-out-consent/ https://bigid.com/blog/opt-in-vs-opt-out-consent/: > • Opt-in consent requires users to actively agree before data collection or processing. > • Opt-out consent allows data collection by default unless the user declines. This is an important distinction, because confusing the two (as you seem to be doing) can lead you both into unethical fraud and legal liability.
surcap526 1mo ago
[dead]
semiquaver 1mo ago
> opt-in by default Sorry to nitpick but the scheme you’re referring to is called “opt-out.”
jacquesm 1mo ago
I don't trust any of these companies with my data, and I assume that whatever data they've got is going to be used, one way or another, no matter what they tell you. It would be nice if you could stick a sentinel in your data that if it ever shows up in the models you know they've broken the rules for sure.
- bluefirebrand 1mo ago
  Yeah. Unfortunately they know you can't catch them on this so they feel absolutely free to do whatever they please If such a data sentinel did exist then we might see them change their behavior
rezonant 1mo ago
Buried by the distraction of the semantics of "opt in" vs "opt out", the more interesting conflict isn't addressed in the sibling threads. > and at the same time seemed to have lost the ability to centrally disable training on prompts for your entire organization vs > Vibe (Teams): Administrators can disable data training usage for the entire organization. Is the document out of date? Or did Mistral reinstate this ability after the fact? What's the story here? Others seem to be stating they have and have had the ability to opt out of training centrally for a long time. EDIT: Oh, it is addressed just a bit hard to find with all the opt in/out explanations: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549102 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549102
- teekert 1mo ago
  You are right! They must have just now switched this back, I also have the toggle now! It was turned on sadly but it’s something.
teekert 1mo ago
Just now the sentence: “Vibe (Teams): Administrators can disable data training usage for the entire organization.” Was added to tfa. And I now see an org wide toggle where there was none before! Sadly it was on so I hope no users submitted stuff in the mean time, but it’s something!

floki165 1mo ago

[flagged]

shujip 1mo ago
Yes. If the privacy control only exists per user, it isn't a control for a team. Defaults matter more than the blog post. "You can opt out" is not the same product as "the org can actually enforce opt out."
throwaway89201 1mo ago
This isn't the case. There's a toggle on https://admin.mistral.ai https://admin.mistral.ai that allows you to disable training for both Vibe and Console/API for your entire organization, I just checked.
- teekert 1mo ago
  I think they removed the toggle for new customers (on the Team plan) because I don’t have it. If I had, I probably wouldn’t have posted this. I mean it’s still annoying that I subscribe my org because they say the toggle is off, then find users telling me in fact it is on. Then to find that I can’t disable it org wide and have to ask each user to “please watch out” is pretty humiliating.

r_lee 1mo ago

European innovation right here you can't make this shit up

segmondy 1mo ago

There are so models that beats all of Mistral models, plus you can run many of them locally. Why would anyone run Mistral?

KPGv2 1mo ago
Possibly because Mistral is a French-based company, so EU companies can cut the American umbilical cord a bit more.
- A_D_E_P_T 1mo ago
  EU companies can download GLM or Kimi-K3 and get way better performance, though? I don't see any case for using a Mistral model when much better open models exist.
  - brendoelfrendo 1mo ago
    Because not everyone has the infrastructure to run that with better performance? Anyway, Mistral serves GLM 5.2 through their global and European endpoints, so if you wanted to leverage their services and use a more powerful open model, that seems to be an option.
  - KPGv2 1mo ago
    Most people don't want a second job trying to figure out self-hosted AI stuff.
jnurmine 1mo ago
To be honest, I have a hard time noticing differences with Claude (in Kiro) and Mistral Vibe, at least with what I use them for. They simply feel like talking to the exact same thing.
perks_12 1mo ago
The OCR stuff is quite usable. Their models perform good at some very basic tasks, so I use them to diversify. But their current model lineup is really terrible.

maxdo 1mo ago

It’s a spyware, but a sovereign one

zoobab 1mo ago
What do you expect from running on "someone else computer?"
- r_lee 1mo ago
  a service provided to you for the money you paid? just like with any other business?
  - pixl97 1mo ago
    Sheet, that is so 20th century. All the other businesses have been bought up by VC, going to rental models, and looking for new and interesting ways to screw you over too.
kieranmaine 1mo ago
How so? I've opted out of using my data for training.
- teekert 1mo ago
  Defaults matter. The expectation for an organization tier plan is not that you have to go and ask each user in your org to please turn off "Allow the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models" before starting your work.
- pixl97 1mo ago
  How many times with large companies have you found that they removed the old opt-out value and put a new one in that is enabled by default because of course it's opt-out? Opt-out doesn't mean dick when the regulatory environment allows them to do things like the above without any recourse. Of course you can go to any other company that follows the exact same rules if you'd like.

DerDerDaIst 1mo ago

Oh come on. So you should be fine with this because "hey we're the friendly europeans..."?

ex1fm3ta 1mo ago

I mean they all do it right ? Mistral is just the first one to publicly say it.

f6v 1mo ago

Same company that has a partnership with Saudis, btw.

icantevenhold 1mo ago
This means exactly what? I think you would be hard pressed to find any relevant tech company that doesn’t have a relationship with the Saudis or is funded by them - or any government for that matter…
- f6v 1mo ago
  Yeah, let's just sweep it under the rug then!
  - icantevenhold 1mo ago
    Nah but be a little bit more specific than just sprinkling random FUD - what is the relationship and why is it problematic ?

maz1b 1mo ago

I could be mistaken, but wasn't Mistral openly championing themselves as a company and EU option that wouldn't do this/didn't do this?

whizzter 1mo ago
Maybe they realized that they were falling behind too much? To me it seems like user-feedback on bad descisions by the AI once it's trained to a basic level is among the most important signals in tuning the model to perform better.
- danelski 1mo ago
  That's what I believe. Once you have scanned every passive source available, using the user conversations to e.g. find common paths to a solution and shortcut them would seem natural.
  - whizzter 1mo ago
    Paths and shortcuts isn't the most important part here I think, rather negative signals about unfitting choices is more important, do we use algorithm/library/etc XYZ in this situation or not, the developers using it would provide the context suitability of options on a more finegrained level than resulting (semi-)public artifacts provide.
mhitza 1mo ago
You must have not been keeping up with the times :) Their big play this year was to write a "whitepaper" on the future state of EU economy, which is something that they'd like to hand of to EU leaders and part of that proposal was some kind of mandatory 10% sovereign AI spend, or some other nonsense like that. They are, at least, trying to make big enterprise (with tailored models, custom integration) and government policy plays. That just goes to show you how ineffective they are as well at making AI click as a usecase. And when they don't get ahead by their own terms they copy what they see ongoing with US AI labs. Le Chat, and Vibe.

Diti 1mo ago

This gets posted literally moments before I was about to pay them after ditching Claude. Thank you! I hate data collection in paid products. I think I will be using Kagi Ultimate for the inference UI, so the data is somewhat anonymized before being collected.

throwaway89201 1mo ago
I'm really hoping Mistral will succeed with their open models, so I'm a bit biased, but I don't have any affiliation. This submit is a bit of well-meaning but confused scaremongering however. Mistral has had, and continues to have, a toggle in the admin settings that permanently disables training on your data. The option has not been removed, and previous opt-outs are still honored. As far as I know, Mistral always trained on your data by default except for the enterprise plan, with the option to disable it on all plans, and with the option for organizations to make the choice for all your users. Kagi Ultimate still uses mostly closed models by OpenAI / Anthropic, etc.
- teekert 1mo ago
  There is no toggle in my admin settings to disable this for the whole org (when on the Team plan). If it was there before they recently removed it. "Mistral always trained on your data by default except for the enterprise plan" - This is not true, until last week all docs stated that the use of your interactions with Vibe to train Mistral's AI models was off by default on the Team plan. Now that is only still the case on the enterprise plan.
evanjrowley 1mo ago
My best experience with Mistral has been with their expensive GLM-5.2 model. It's actually developed by Z.ai, but unlike Z.ai, the GLM-5.2 at Mistral can be used at a low price without training on your prompts - but only if you remember to hit the privacy toggle in their admin settings. Planning code changes with GLM-5.2 using a Mistral Studio API key and implementing code changes using the Mistral Vibe API key has worked well for me. At my basic subscription tier, Vibe will share data with Mistral. It works for me because, when it comes to privacy, I care less about the actual code and more about the planning / high-level stuff.

perks_12 1mo ago

I assume they do this no before releasing new models. It feels like they expect higher user influx from their new models.

saaaaaam 1mo ago

This is a hugely misleading editorialised title. The page title is "Can I opt out of my input or output data being used for training". Right at the top of the page it says "In certain cases, your input and output data (such as conversations, documents, and other user-provided content) may be included in Mistral’s model training programs. You retain full control over this processing and have the right to opt out of these programs at any time."

heaney-555 1mo ago
This is the case for all the major AI providers. Training collection is on by default, but you can opt out.
- teekert 1mo ago
  "No model training on your content by default" [0] It's not the default on any Team plans and didn't used to be at Mistral (until last week or so). The team plan has a central admin role and page, and "seats". And if it was the default, then I'd still expect a big button to turn it off for all seats, and not have to ask all user separately. But this changed over night and that button is not there. Although I expect it used to be, because some people here report that they have it. https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise https://claude.com/pricing#team-&-enterprise
kieranmaine 1mo ago
Agreed. I read the title as they would start using my data for training and I couldn't opt-out. After looking at the page and checking my app (I have Pro subscription) it seems like I can opt-out and my initial opt-out when I subscribed was preserved.
- teekert 1mo ago
  When I started my search for an AI "partner" the Mistral TEAM plan had "use my prompts for training" turned off by default, as per their docs in multiple places. I could have sworn I saw a organization switch in my dashboard for this setting org wide, but am not sure. I start the subscription, users report it is "on" by default, I ask support what's up, they say "sorry, docs should have been updated earlier but they are now". And they give me a lot of credits. I just want to warn people, the Team sub just changed, docs were update too late, there was very little press about this (in my view) very important change. Actually, it is so important that I would not advice Mistral to our management if they'd use our prompts for training, so I take a TEAM sub so this is disabled for sure, or I can disable this org wide. But I can't anymore, now I have to ask each user/seat to disable sharing, and hope they do, I have no way to check. Way to inspire confidence. And their response: "You can still do this with the Enterprise subscription". We flamed Anthropic for their switcheroo with their personal Pro plan a year ago [0], now Mistral does it with their business focused Team plan, so they deserve some fire imo. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45076274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45076274

krunck 1mo ago

Very disappointing. I really get the sense that all AI companies and anti-privacy parasites on society.

danelski 1mo ago

Most commenters here clutching their pearls as if Claude and Gemini Pro didn't do it already. In the latter you (as a paying customer) can't even store the chat history unless you agree to their 'improvement of services'. Do you have all your accounts paid for by the enterprise or you never check the settings?

rdm_blackhole 1mo ago
> Most commenters here clutching their pearls as if Claude and Gemini Pro didn't do it already. That's not the point though. The problem is that in the minds of lots of people including here on HN or otherwise, a service based in the EU is de-facto "more" respectful of digital privacy. You can read the comments on threads related to the EU tech where you will find people defending to the very end that privacy is better in the EU and that EU providers will never stoop as low as their US counterparts. As always the truth is a lot murkier than that. Yes, some services based in the EU are better in terms of privacy but it's not a given for all of them and it depends entirely on the service. Unfortunately such a nuanced take is not wildly popular in the tech world in this day and age where every US company is labelled as an evil data hungry entity and EU companies are portrayed as saints in this regard. That's where the first problem lies. The second problem is that for years now, people have been singing the praises of Mistral as a privacy friendly alternative the the US juggernauts because Mistral's headquarters is located in the EU and unfortunately today it seems some people are waking up to the fact that Mistral is doing the same thing than its US counterparts and they are disappointed which is understandable. Who is to blame for this dichotomy? Is it Mistral who leaned too much on this marketing angle (the European Chatgpt without the invasive tracking/ better privacy settings) or is it the users who failed to realize that EU or not, Mistral wasn't going to pass on the opportunity to improve its models this way? My hunch is that it's both.
- icantevenhold 1mo ago
  No one is saying that every US company is an evil data hungry entity and EU companies are saints. But fact of the matter is that the US is rapidly sliding into totalitarianism and at the same time US tech companies have an hu huge influence worldwide. I commend any alternative that comes from outside the US and also offers an “open source” selfhosted option.

vb-8448 1mo ago

My bet is that mistral models will suddenly start to shine.

chris_explicare 1mo ago

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matthieu_bl 1mo ago

Summary of the different scenarios Service: Vibe Plan: Non-Enterprise Default: Opted in Opt-out possible? Yes Service: Vibe Plan: Enterprise Default: Opted out Opt-out possible? Yes (admin-managed) Service: Mistral Studio/API Plan: Not specified Default: Not stated, I assume opted in Opt-out possible? Yes

ylisav 1mo ago

Very disappointing, but who doesn't train on user data? It's the only moat they have

mhitza 1mo ago
I had the option, and had it disable everywhere, manually. The only one I didn't use, at all, is Anthropics service because of iffy Dario aura and their terms of service. Where is training in user data enforced and not possible to opt out?

romanovcode 1mo ago

I'm sure that the 3 users they have are very pissed about this news.

htrp 1mo ago

LeChat when it was launched as a consumer product was always going to be a data acquisition play. This is them just making it very clear and disclosing as per European rules.

gkbrk 1mo ago

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lukeschlather 1mo ago

I'd be interested in some legal/GDPR takes on PII handling in prompts. If someone enters PII into a prompt, and Mistral retains it for training, is it sufficient for them to say "don't enter PII into prompts?" Of course with Claude and so on this bothers me too, but it doesn't seem like there's any real recourse under US law. But I would hope that "oh you shouldn't enter PII" isn't going to cut it under European law, that if I say "don't store my prompts, they include PII I don't want you storing" should be sufficient here under the GDPR and Mistral shouldn't be able to just store it anyway.

TZubiri 1mo ago
They might circumvent this by adding a prompt like "remove PII from this prompt", so I don't think it's a worthwhile route. The issue exists whether PII is input or not, like IP or secrets.

asyncze 1mo ago

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xyst 1mo ago

the rapid enshittification in LLM hype cycle is something else. Got to love the private equity parasites ruining everything for the sake of profit.

senordevnyc 1mo ago
I didn’t realize Mistral was owned by private equity.

LoveMistral 1mo ago

They wouldn’t dare train on language inputs from the wild, but they will happily strip out any code snippets you’re providing and sell/train on that à la GitHub/Copilot. File uploads too

TZubiri 1mo ago
What? They dared train on random websites like reddit, training on language inputs from the wild is the name of the game
- ycCantCode 1mo ago
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TZubiri 1mo ago

i don't get the legal aspect of this if you sign the contract (click I agree on Terms of Service), and it says that they do not train on the data, by what right can they backtrack on that? Maybe it is assumed that they notified you and you have the right to terminate the contract? Relying on some clause where the contract can be updated at any time. Or terminated at any time (with the presumption that a clause change is a termination and an automatic signing of the new contract, but that's weak)

teekert 1mo ago
I think it only goes for new users/orgs. I was caught between the time they changed the default and updated their docs. I don't believe they would alter users/organizations exiting choices. In facts, from some of the responses it seems that some still retain the toggle to opt out their entire org.

ycCantCode 1mo ago

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rectang 1mo ago

I pay for a subscription to Duck.ai mainly because I don't want to be constantly fighting my vendor to protect my privacy. Microsoft already did a rug pull on me and opted me in to training months after I signed up with Github Copilot. It exhausting and ultimately futile to monitor these companies. It's not guaranteed that Duck.ai will continue to uphold its promise of not training on your sessions — if the company gets bought by Microsoft, it's only a matter of time before the switch to "you can opt out at any time". But since privacy is Duck.ai's brand, it will be somewhat harder for them to hide what they're doing should they betray their customers. I also don't actually trust that Duck.ai sub-vendors OpenAI and Anthropic will uphold whatever contract they have with Duck.ai — the whole AI business model is built on lawless consumption of others work. We'll ultimately have to run our own models locally, because it's impractical to defend against untrustworthy AI vendors.

nozzlegear 1mo ago
I also pay for duck.ai's service. They're my main "chat bot" thing, and while I had already been paying for their other services when I discovered I also had a duck.ai subscription, I choose to use them primarily because privacy is their whole brand. I only have two minor complainst: I want my conversations to sync between mobile and desktop (while being E2E), and I want a way to organize conversations into "projects" or grouped chats.
- samename 1mo ago
  Have you tried Lumo by Proton? It is E2EE and has projects. A bit more expensive than duck.ai but I found the model to be good enough
  - forabi 1mo ago
    How could a cloud LLM be E2EE?
    - lukewarm707 1mo ago
      it isn't.

EFLKumo 1mo ago

Come on, think how fast Grok evolves after SoaceXAI acquired Cursor. I just believe if you can't get enough real data from practice then you can't train a good model. And for Mistral collecting data is a must step no matter what approach it takes.

tensor 1mo ago

I just checked my admin dashboard and training on my data is (still?) off. Maybe I already set it to off when I signed up, I don't really remember.

teekert 1mo ago
They don’t switch it for you probably, that would be very bad. But the default for new users and orgs on the Team plan just changed. But they didn’t update the docs for a while which left me confused as I started my subscription after they switched but before they updated their docs.

zelphirkalt 1mo ago

I remember this being the default for a while already. When I signed up and got an API key, I remember I did turn off the training option specifically, so it must have already been a default to have training on input on.

teekert 1mo ago
This is about the Team plan specifically, which was like enterprise before. And it’s about the removal of the option to disable training on user input for all users from said plan at the org level, all last week.

creativeSlumber 1mo ago

> Vibe: users are not opted out by default > Vibe (Enterprise): customers are opted out of training by default So they made it opt in for enterprise (how it should be), but intentionally made opt out for regular user.Basically saying "screw you: to regular users. Any self respecting user should stop using them.

moffkalast 1mo ago

I'd send them a GDPR request, if I had an reason to use their fifth rate cloud models.

bigbuppo 1mo ago

Great news if you want your LLM to be horny, I guess.

scotty79 1mo ago

I wonder how much the progress is slowed down just because most companies don't train on consumer convos. Assuming they really don't.

threecheese 1mo ago

Realistically, what are the risks? I get not wanting info you provide to AI being used against you in the future, like if you are gay and move to a country where that’s illegal (or live in one where it becomes illegal), but is “training” an actual risk here? I would assume that PII is redacted, and so beyond redaction failure, the real risk here seems to be to intellectual property and not to personal privacy. Edit: Does “use for training” include “we store all your chat logs forever tied to your identity”?

LtWorf 1mo ago
Seems in USA you can go to jail for going somewhere else to legally have an abortion. So for example that.
randomblock1 1mo ago
The retain it for "the duration necessary to achieve the intended purposes", which could mean forever.

dang 1mo ago

Submitted title was "Mistral now trains on user input by default, except on enterprise tier". THat's good information (if true) but best suited to a comment in the thread rather than the title (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22level%20playing%20field%22%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...). We've changed it to the article title now per https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

20k 1mo ago

You have to be rather naive if you don't think these companies don't simply train on your prompts with or without your consent. They literally scrape everything - legal or not - and claim its fair use to train on, including straight piracy The idea that they'll steal from everyone except you is just wishful thinking

WarmWash 1mo ago
It would be catastrohic for any of the big labs if it came out that they were training on what was sold as private. I get this cynical conspiratorial energy, it fits the internet well, but I can assure you most people with even mild business sense would be intensely opposed to this idea. Well, except maybe Zuckerburg, but they don't really do enterprise anyway.
- r_lee 1mo ago
  exactly, I don't understand how HN doesn't understand this by this logic every business contract in tech is just a bunch of lies and means nothing and the only way to do anything is to have a server sitting next to you, otherwise it's "someone else's computer"
  - 20k 1mo ago
    I mean, they've already violated the law in acquiring all their training data already, why would they be uncomfortable violating a contract to get more training data?
    - vineyardmike 1mo ago
      Because violating the law was the prerequisite to starting their business, without it they're worth $0 and have no models. They've already survived Training on customer input may help the models but it isn't "bet the farm" helpful. Now, they have a thriving business, so they shouldn't risk their business for incremental data that they can buy. At this point, the reputation of the business matters too. Fable explicitly didn't support zero-retention usage, and it saw significantly lower adoption vs other flagship models, and their past releases. Being caught abusing enterprise contracts is really hard to dig out of.

olejorgenb 1mo ago

> In the Admin panel[links to the admin panel], open the Privacy menu in the left-hand navigation bar. Why not link to the https://admin.mistral.ai/plateforme/privacy https://admin.mistral.ai/plateforme/privacy panel directly

luciana1u 1mo ago

[flagged]

Lucasoato 1mo ago

Question: when AI companies say they don’t train on your input or output, do they mean that they don’t train on an extremely simple AI rework of your input or output as well?

j4k0bfr 1mo ago
Damn, that's an interesting point. Having a model transform your work into 'independent' IP and then training on that. I would assume any actual trade secrets (e.g. recipes, financial info) are protected but... tech companies have bent the law before. I'm assuming they've all at least thought about it quite hard, which is worrying in-and-of itself :).

thoughtpeddler 1mo ago

For all the people here alleging that AI companies will train on your data even when you as a user explicitly opt out of training and their terms say they will respect that, etc - do you also believe that within a few years of them having harvested your data, you could perform "knowledge probing" on their models by prompting various questions that determine if they can near-verbatim reproduce your unique data, and then have enough other people do the same that you can then just launch a class-action lawsuit? Because if not... I've got a startup idea for you.

croes 1mo ago

> users are not opted out by default Of course because you can’t be opt out by default that would be called opt in.

__MatrixMan__ 1mo ago

I'd like to provide extra context to help with training. Like, here's my codebase and the logs and the docs, feel free to ask me questions about it... Whatever makes the next version more applicable to the problems I'm trying to solve would be excellent. I just wish I could force them to share it with their competitors also.

sbinnee 1mo ago

I remember mistral provides some free credits for opting in data for training. And for some reason I could not find this option anywhere in my console. Does someone know if this plan still exists?

_blackhawk_ 1mo ago

ZDR on OpenRouter + Aperture by Tailscale. And you should be good with the right config

deleted 1mo ago

[deleted]

luciana1u 1mo ago

[flagged]

munksbeer 1mo ago

I can understand companies not wanting to leak sensitive data or information, so not wanting their inputs used for training. But the individual level moral perspective confuses me. You object to your own input being used for training "for free", but you're ok to use models which already slurped the data of millions of other people "for free"? I don't get it. Obviously this is going to be a controversial take on here (I am not blind to the sentiment), so, please help me understand. If you're a conscientious objector, why are you using the models in the first place?

greggoB 1mo ago
Private users also have sensitive information which, if leaked, could be used to their detriment (e.g training data getting hacked, etc). I don't see any distinction between companies and people when it comes to moral objections re training data - at least, if that's a thing, I'm unaware of it. I do agree with your last point re the hypocrisy.
dsign 1mo ago
There's something to this argument. I for one use an API proxy (Kagi Assistant) when I'm submitting anything remotely sensitive to an LLM. But for coding in my hobby project, I have marked "use my conversations for training" in the Claude app. I do it in the off chance that one day we will use stupid amounts of compute for personalized medicine and to fight cancer; code for scientific and technical computing is really complicated and only a tiny fraction of humans can produce it.
- munksbeer 1mo ago
  If I understand your comment correctly (and highly likely I missed something), I am very similar. Using stuff at work the AI team tries their best to ensure we don't leak our internal data or code. But for my personal use, I'm totally fine with helping train the models. I'll be called naive, but I'm on the optimist side of the fence here. I hope, and expect, AI actually frees us up and delivers much improved lives for everyone. I know this goes against the current zeitgeist, but it is genuinely what I think will happen rather than the dystopia most people predict.

beyondscale-yes 1mo ago

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amelius 1mo ago

Can we have a unicode character that means "don't use for AI training", and another one for "this is AI generated data", and while we're at it one for "don't use for advertising purposes".

alescalaios 1mo ago

[flagged]

greenjudge 1mo ago

[flagged]

daRealDodo 1mo ago

You can check-out any time, but you can never leave.

xtiansimon 1mo ago

Ha! I was researching local llm’s training yesterday—I _want this_ for my local llm project.

Noaidi 1mo ago

No one will read this but AI probably. I am done with contributing to AI. I never used AI but even posting here I am contributing to it as AI is known to scrape HN. https://alterlab.io/blog/how-to-give-your-ai-agent-access-to-hacker-news-data https://alterlab.io/blog/how-to-give-your-ai-agent-access-to... So no more data for them. No more social media, no more cloud storage, just no more. It's been fun, but I am smarter than AI, so bye.

selicos 1mo ago

Run local or expect some data to be used for development. These companies did not create these tools by paying fair market value for the content.

rezonant 1mo ago

Can anyone shed light on why there's a button for copying specifically for LLMs ("Copy for LLM") and why there's also an "Open in Claude" option on these articles? Regarding the former, there's no normal Copy button so presumably this just copies the content of the article. Not sure why it needs to be clarified that its for LLMs.

camerondennis 25d ago

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mjprintz 28d ago

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