#147. ⚠️LinkedIn defaults you into AI training (again) — and buries the opt-out

LinkedIn just expanded its AI training program to the UK, EU, Switzerland, Canada, and Hong Kong. As of November 3rd, your profile, posts, and feed activity are being scraped to train AI models — unless you manually opt out.

If you’re in the US, something like this happened back in January 2025, too, when a class action lawsuit alleged LinkedIn was training on private(!) messages. That suit was quickly dismissed.

Feeding your professional content into training data changes is wildly bold decision by LinkedIn. Your career achievements, industry insights, and professional network activity become training material for tools that may compete with you, summarize your expertise without attribution, or generate content that dilutes the value of original human work.

The idea that this isn’t opt-in by default — rather than opt-in — is as astonishing as it is unsurprising; this is what pretty much all platforms seem to do (foundational models like ChatGPT and Claude, too).

How to opt out

1. Go to Me → Settings & Privacy

2. Select Data Privacy on the left sidebar

3. Find "Data for Generative AI Improvement" and toggle OFF

Admittedly, the question isn't whether your data will be used — it will, especially for a free service where, as they say, YOU are the data — it's whether companies will respect your agency in deciding how. Opt-out-by-default isn't respect; it’s permission by exhaustion.

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