OT: Unwanted AI intrusion

On 04/03/2025 18:02, Davey wrote: as no suggestion that this was going to happen.

It is if you use shitbag services like Yahoo.

You can see the "logic" - "some people get 1000's of messages a day and can't keep up with them, with our snazzy AI we can highlight the important ones, and then summarise those to make them quicker to read"

Of course the reality is that they will now either fail to see the important ones at all since they have been categorised into some smart folder they would not think of looking in, and when they do find them they now have to spend even longer reading through the AI summary *and* the whole original message to work out how the AI got the wrong end of the stick.

Reddit says:

"I turned it off by going to settings->message preview->then toggle off AI summaries"

at the recipient (Yahoo) end.

Paul

Thanks, I will pass that to him post-haste.

Quite likely. But it is not me that is using Yahoo!, it is the other guy.

Ask ChatGPT ?

LOL

Yes but saying "if one uses shitbag services" sounded a bit poncy.

I think out of courtesy, some header feature should be given to senders that disables this receiving retranslation, and allows handling of messages with privacy.

Actually, the OP could almost do that.

I wonder if ye set PGP encryption on the email, would that bypass the AI translation on the client? A quick google suggests the yahoo client supports PGP, and so does Thunderbird etc...

One of the features for encryption is to avoid man-in-the-middle attacks. I suppose and hope this excludes AI-in-the-middle.

Worth testing!

And this is his reply:

"Okay, I followed what you found: Settings > message preview.... and there is NO message preview.

That is exactly the nightmare of any 'site', that offers 'assistance'. To find what's needed is a stinking nightmare.

So, I called Yahoo. And guess what? The prompt says have the credit card ready, for 'assistance'. Unbelievable. And, have the driver license ready, too.

None of that. I got hold of an agent, and let him have it. AI, the 'summary' is an intrusion on privacy. NO site can, and should assume it can 'summarize. anyone's e-mail messages. He seemed to have 'got' it.

I asked where, to click off this AI summary crap, and he doesn't seem to know. Just, he says, it's the 'enhanced' version of Yahoo.

I said, show me where, since it's not at all clear and easy to find, where to go back to the original, BASIIC mail appearance page. I did that. And, asked, will this eliminate, will that AI summary stuff disappear. He said it should."

And so it goes on, They "know" what We want, but don't bother to ask us. We will see what happens. If anything.

Nobody said it was you personally. Once upon a grammar one might have said 'if one were to use Yahoo' But times have changed

There seem to be applications you can run for the free (Ad Supported) Yahoo or the Yahoo Plus (paid, monthly) version. As well, there are web browser versions of the two as well. Presumably, when you log into the web page, it uses your account version to create the web page for that version.

That could mean, roughly four different "experiences" times the rolling-release model as they fumble with the controls on a daily basis.

Simple, right ? Nothing a four-dimensional cartographer cannot handle.

Paul

Hopefully, it has been stopped. I will be able to confirm later in the day, we have a 5 hour time difference.

But he also reports that reverting to the old 'Human Intelligence' system has had another effect: the old method of moving messages to a local folder has now changed from a one-click process to a four-click process. Onwards and upwards! 'We are always striving to improve your Experience', Yeah, right.