Google Gemini is set to become a significantly better phone assistant thanks to these two small upgrades
- Google Gemini can more easily access your Phone and Messages apps
- Previously, you had to allow Gemini Apps Activity, reducing your privacy
- That’s no longer the case, and comes as Gemini RCS support leaks too
Google looks set to give Google Gemini some serious upgrades by allowing it greater access to your apps without forcing you to tweak your privacy settings, and giving it new abilities within those apps.
You might have seen an email that Google sent to Android phone users stating that Gemini will be able to interact with the Phone, Messages, WhatsApp, and Utilities apps, even if you have Gemini Apps Activity switched off.
The immediate reaction was one of concern, but this is actually a huge privacy win.
With Gemini Apps Activity switched on, Google can see an activity log of how you use Gemini – personal data it can then use to develop its products further. If you want to keep this data more private, you had to lose out on Gemini being able to access extensions, which allow it to perform actions using other apps, such as texting someone if you ask it to.
This change means you can keep your activity log private while still not losing out on these basic smart assistant features, which Google’s Assistant has had for years.
Though that’s not to say Google won’t store any of your Gemini activity even if this setting is off. Google admits it will store some activity data for at most 72 hours. It’s stored for 24 hours within Gemini so that the AI can respond to your conversations contextually. The longer limit is for security and safety reasons, which you can find out more about on Google’s support page.
RCS support incoming?
Perhaps in preparation for Gemini having easy access to Messages – and so presumably more people using the app – Gemini is getting an RCS upgrade too, apparently.
That’s based on Android Authority’s analysis of the latest Google app files, which hints at RCS coming to Gemini because the AI can fetch the device’s RCS capabilities. This would only be necessary if the AI were RCS compatible.
This is significant because currently, Gemini’s inability to use RCS means it’s unable to send or play audio, images, or video through the Google Messages app. With access to this messaging standard, that could very quickly change.
As with similar leaks, there’s no guarantee that Gemini will get RCS support any time soon (or at all), but it certainly makes plenty of sense as an upgrade, so it’s one we’ll be keeping our eye out for.
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