Is Meta using your private DMs to train its AI?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not inherently bad and is the logical next step in our technological evolution. However, how it has been handled by social media and tech companies, and presented to the public, has created an image where anything AI-related is already deemed evil at first glance—from threatening to replace the workforce to instances of replicating and plagiarizing creative works across various media. Who’s to blame them for not trusting the promise of AI?
However, this existing distrust towards AI also gives rise to instances of fear-mongering, where certain digital actors take advantage of people’s fear of unfamiliar technology.
The latest of which comes from a string of social media posts warning users of Meta’s Dec. 16 policy change, which would allegedly allow the company to comb through your private messages across all Meta apps to train its AI. The tagline: “Every conversation. Every photo. Every voice message. Fed into AI. Used for profit,” says HustleWithChip on Instagram, which currently has over 270,000 likes as of writing.
It isn’t as scandalous as you think
Even back on Oct. 1, 2025, when Meta first announced this policy change, they had already been clear with how Meta AI will interact with your personal data: it won’t. Instead, it will only use data gathered from your conscious and intentional interactions with Meta AI, and use that to personalize your experience—from the ads you see to the reels and pages scattered around your timeline.
Meta’s October announcement reads: “Whether it’s a voice chat or a text exchange with our AI features, this update will help us improve the recommendations we provide for people across our platforms so they’re more likely to see content they’re actually interested in—and less of the content they’re not.”
In short, you actually have to start a conversation with the Meta AI chatbot for this policy change to even matter to you. They even added an example of how this would work: “If you chat with Meta AI about hiking, we may learn that you’re interested in hiking—just as we would if you posted a reel about hiking or liked a hiking-related page. As a result, you might start seeing recommendations for hiking groups, posts from friends about trails, or ads for hiking boots.”
But they’re not really that far off
“Every conversation. Every photo. Every voice message. Fed into AI. Used for profit,” isn’t exactly too far off, sans the “every.” Instead, gathering this data isn’t only for Meta’s charitable act of customizing your social media experience, but for both training their AI and increasing the visibility of their ads—hence, billions upon billions of dollars for profit.
And you? The unwittingly, willingly, and not to mention, unpaid beta tester who’ll help them meet their targets regardless.
So it’s not as dystopian as you’ve been told. In fact, it’s merely an extension of what we already know: how you use Meta’s social media platforms will dictate the kind of ads you will see—you are your algorithm, so we say.
But when our interactions with their AI not only trains their clanker but also improves their ad revenue—when companies like Warner and Disney can earn from letting AI learn from their intellectual IP—why can’t we? It’s another day of being left out of a money machine you’re unknowingly running.
