As for Doe, he was “disappointed” to learn that full and partial transcripts of chats discussing his family’s financial data were allegedly shared as PII with Google and Meta. His complaint says he relies on Perplexity to help him manage his taxes, get legal advice and make investment decisions. Without an injunction stopping Perplexity’s alleged ongoing privacy abuses, he complained, he would be barred from using his favorite search engine.
The lawsuit alleges that other users of the proposed class likely turned to Perplexity while researching other sensitive topics. According to the lawsuit, the companies designed the ad trackers to operate “covertly” so that they could allegedly “exploit this sensitive data for their own benefit, including targeting individuals with advertising and reselling their sensitive data to additional third parties.”
Perhaps most troubling is that people often use such AI systems to research health and medical information, especially when consulting a human being might be embarrassing or upsetting.
The complaint says that Perplexity has been trained to request that users upload sensitive records during chat sessions, allegedly taking advantage of users’ tendency to overshare with the AI system. The complaint states that it contains information that, if shared with Google and Meta, could cause users to be suddenly targeted with advertisements that they may find “extremely disturbing, or in many cases, physically harmful”.
For example, Perplexity responds to a basic prompt such as “What is the best treatment for liver cancer?” The complaint states that volunteering “I can help you interpret a specific scan report, biopsy results or proposed treatment plan if you share more details.”
The lawsuit says the offensive trackers embedded in Perplexity’s AI search engine include the Facebook Meta Pixel, Google Ads and Google Double Click, as well as possibly a technology that Meta calls a “conversion API.” Their complaint states that Meta allegedly recommends that partners use that last technology in conjunction with the Meta pixel, as it allegedly acts as a “workaround” that prevents “savvy users” from blocking pixel tracking. Notably, Meta has faced several privacy lawsuits opposing that technology, some with settlements, while Congress has debarred some former partners who used Google and Meta’s trackers.
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