Key Points:
- LinkedIn officially began using user profile data and public posts to train AI models starting November 3, 2025, across multiple regions
- Policy affects users in EU, European Economic Area, Canada, Switzerland, Hong Kong, and India by default unless they opt out
- Private messages explicitly excluded from AI training and remain secure, but all public profile information and posts are fair game for model improvement
- User data may be shared with Microsoft and affiliates for targeted advertising purposes under the new Terms of Service agreement
- LinkedIn claims AI training will improve user experience and connection opportunities, though critics argue it prioritizes corporate interests over privacy
- Users can opt out in Settings & Privacy > Data Privacy > “Data for Generative AI Improvement” toggle
- Opt-out is not automatic: users in affected regions must manually disable data sharing or their information is used by default
- Change applies retroactively to existing users; no separate consent required under new terms
New Delhi: LinkedIn has quietly implemented a sweeping change to its data practices, beginning to harvest millions of user profiles and public posts to train artificial intelligence models, a move that has sparked immediate privacy concerns across the professional community. Effective immediately on November 3, 2025, the Microsoft-owned platform is now actively using your professional information to power AI features, with data potentially flowing to Microsoft and its corporate affiliates for targeted advertising purposes.
Default Opt-In Model Creates Privacy Risk
The most troubling aspect of LinkedIn’s new policy is its use of an opt-in default structure, meaning that unless users take active steps to disable data sharing, their profiles and posts are automatically enrolled in the AI training program. This represents a significant shift from privacy-protective default settings, placing the burden squarely on individual users to protect their own data rather than requiring LinkedIn to seek affirmative consent before using information.
“Starting November 3, 2025, we will use user data in certain regions to train AI models, improving the user experience and connection opportunities on the platform,” LinkedIn stated in its official announcement. The euphemistic language emphasizing “improvement” and “opportunities” obscures the fundamental reality that corporate entities are harvesting professional information without explicit user consent.
Geographic Reach: India Included
LinkedIn’s policy extends far beyond Europe and North America, explicitly including India among affected countries. This means hundreds of millions of Indian professionals using LinkedIn have their data enrolled in AI training by default, unless they navigate to obscure settings menus to opt out. The inclusion of India, a country with growing digital privacy concerns and limited regulatory protection compared to the EU’s GDPR, raises significant questions about protection standards for data in different jurisdictions.
Public Data as Training Material
LinkedIn explicitly clarified that only public profile information and posts will be used for AI model training, not private messages or non-public content. However, the definition of “public” on LinkedIn remains broad and includes professional details many users assume are semi-private—work history, education, skills endorsements, accomplishments, and any posts shared with “public” visibility settings.
The company acknowledged privacy concerns by excluding direct messages from AI training, stating clearly: “private messages will remain completely secure and will not be used in any AI training”. However, this limited carve-out does little to address the scope of public information available for corporate AI development.
Data Sharing with Microsoft and Affiliates
A critical component of the policy involves sharing user data with Microsoft and its network of affiliates for “targeted advertising” purposes. This extends LinkedIn’s data usage well beyond the platform itself, feeding information into Microsoft’s broader advertising and AI infrastructure. Users who believed their professional information was confined to LinkedIn’s platform will now discover their data flowing through Microsoft’s ecosystem.
LinkedIn’s Justification: Better Experiences
LinkedIn frames the policy change as beneficial to users, claiming that AI training will “provide users with a better experience and appropriate opportunities”. The company’s language emphasizes how AI improvements will supposedly enhance recommendations, job matches, and networking functionality. However, this framing conveniently overlooks the corporate benefit of harvesting high-quality professional training data without paying users for the value of their information.
The Power Asymmetry
The policy change highlights a fundamental power imbalance in digital platforms: companies make unilateral decisions about data usage, implement them with opaque default settings, and place responsibility for protection on individual users. Most LinkedIn users will never see the policy change notification, will never navigate to the obscure Data Privacy settings, and will remain unaware that their professional information is fueling AI model development.
Opt-Out Process: Steps to Protect Yourself
For users who value their privacy and wish to prevent LinkedIn from using their data for AI training, the platform has provided an opt-out mechanism, though it is deliberately buried in settings:
Step-by-step opt-out instructions:
- Open LinkedIn and log in to your account
- Click your profile picture located in the top-left corner
- Navigate to “Settings & Privacy”
- Select “Data Privacy” from the available options
- Locate “Data for Generative AI Improvement”
- Toggle the setting OFF to disable data sharing
This multi-step process, requiring users to navigate through multiple menus and locate a specific toggle, reflects LinkedIn’s effort to make opting out sufficiently inconvenient that many users simply won’t bother. The deliberate complexity of the process contrasts sharply with the simplicity of implementing the opt-in default.
Regional Compliance vs. Global Practice
While LinkedIn justifies the policy change by noting it affects specific regions (EU, EEA, Canada, Switzerland, Hong Kong, and India), the company’s broader AI development efforts likely extend to all user data globally. The explicit listing of affected regions may create the false impression that users outside these territories are protected, when in reality, LinkedIn’s AI infrastructure presumably benefits from training on professional data worldwide.
What LinkedIn Gains
LinkedIn’s transition to AI training represents enormous corporate value extraction. The platform now possesses millions of human-curated professional profiles, detailed career histories, skills assessments, education credentials, and professional accomplishments—exactly the high-quality training data that AI companies need to develop sophisticated algorithms. This data, accumulated through years of users voluntarily building their professional profiles, is now being redirected toward corporate AI development without additional compensation to the individuals who created it.
Implications for Professional Privacy
The policy change raises fundamental questions about professional privacy in the digital age. LinkedIn users often maintain profiles with the understanding that they control the visibility and usage of their professional information. The new policy undermines this assumption, transforming users’ professional data from information they control into corporate training resources.
For job seekers, the policy creates additional complications opting out of AI training might affect algorithmic visibility and job recommendation algorithms, potentially disadvantaging those who choose privacy protection.
The Broader AI Data Crisis
LinkedIn’s move reflects a broader corporate strategy across the technology industry to harvest user data for AI model training without transparent consent or compensation. Major technology companies are aggressively scraping internet data, including professional profiles, creative works, and personal information, to train increasingly sophisticated AI systems. LinkedIn’s policy change represents one of the few instances where a company explicitly acknowledges this practice, though many others conduct similar training quietly without public announcement.
Data Protection Concerns
In India specifically, where data protection regulations remain fragmented and enforcement mechanisms limited, the transfer of professional information to Microsoft’s global affiliate network raises significant security and sovereignty concerns. Indian professionals’ career information, educational backgrounds, and work history potentially sensitive data in competitive employment markets, will now be incorporated into AI systems managed by American corporations.
Timeline and Implementation
LinkedIn has already begun implementing this policy as of November 3, 2025, meaning users who have not yet opted out have already had their data enrolled in AI training starting today. The company did not provide advance notice periods or transition time for users to adjust their privacy settings, making immediate action necessary for those concerned about data usage.
What Users Should Do
Immediate actions:
- Opt out if privacy is a concern by following the steps outlined above
- Review your profile visibility to ensure sensitive professional information is appropriately restricted
- Reconsider what information you share publicly on LinkedIn going forward
- Monitor your LinkedIn account for future policy changes that may further expand data usage
The Bigger Picture
LinkedIn’s AI training policy change exemplifies how tech companies continue to find new ways to extract value from user data, often with minimal transparency and maximum corporate benefit. While the company provides opt-out options, the default structure ensures that most users will unknowingly contribute their professional information to corporate AI development.
As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly central to technology company business models, professional networking platforms like LinkedIn represent particularly valuable data sources combining detailed career information with real-time connection patterns and interaction data. The shift toward AI training data extraction will likely accelerate across the platform industry, making individual data protection increasingly difficult without stronger regulatory frameworks.
For LinkedIn users in India and elsewhere affected by this policy, the choice is clear: either take immediate action to opt out of AI training or accept that your professional information is now part of the global AI development infrastructure controlled by corporate entities.
