Spirit Airlines wants to sell its data to Google. Is there a privacy issue?

By Vinod Sreeharsha, Miami Herald They lost their paychecks, livelihoods, and health insurance this spring. Now, they may lose their privacy. As out-of-business Spirit Airlines liquidates, the planes and the landing rights aren’t the only leftovers for sale. The people overseeing the remaining assets also want to sell employee data to Google to train artificial intelligence. At first, workers put up a big “No” when told about the plan. But over the past month, opposition has softened. A bankruptcy court hearing on the issue, after several postponements, is now set for Nov. 6. Why does Silicon Valley want Spirit’s worker info? Because AI machines grow more useful when fed lots of real-world data on humans. Spirit’s efforts to sell tranches of data to Google for $10 million hit several speed bumps after getting public attention in August. Criticism immediately poured from unions and businesses. Data on passengers aren’t part of the proposed sale. Related Articles Google s A