{"id":197987,"date":"2026-03-21T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-21T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/21\/thousands-of-people-are-selling-their-identities-to-train-ai-but-at-what-cost-ai-artificial-intelligence\/"},"modified":"2026-03-21T10:30:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-21T14:30:15","slug":"thousands-of-people-are-selling-their-identities-to-train-ai-but-at-what-cost-ai-artificial-intelligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/21\/thousands-of-people-are-selling-their-identities-to-train-ai-but-at-what-cost-ai-artificial-intelligence\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands of people are selling their identities to train AI \u2013 but at what cost? | AI (artificial intelligence)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/2026\/mar\/21\/ai-trainers-identity-cost\">Thousands of people are selling their identities to train AI \u2013 but at what cost? | AI (artificial intelligence)<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/2026\/mar\/21\/ai-trainers-identity-cost\">https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/2026\/mar\/21\/ai-trainers-identity-cost<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Publish Date: <a href=\"publish_date]\">2026-03-21 10:00:00<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Source Domain: <a href=\"www.theguardian.com\">www.theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Here are the main points from the article:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Emerging Data Economy<\/strong>: Thousands of individuals around the world, primarily in developing countries due to economic necessity, are monetizing their biometric identities and personal data to train AI.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Data Marketplaces<\/strong>: Apps like Kled AI, Silencio, and Neon Mobile pay users to contribute videos, photos, audio recordings, and personal conversations to supply the high-quality human data AI models need.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Earnings Disparities<\/strong>: For some, the money earned from these gig AI training jobs represents a significant income, covering a few weeks&#8217; grocery expenses, or even sufficient to pay for training courses. <\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Privacy Trade-offs<\/strong>: Participants often grant irreversible licenses for their data, including the right for platforms to create derivative works. Without clear stipulations, this can lead to data misuse, identification theft, and deepfake scenarios.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Economic and Ethical Concerns<\/strong>: While immediate earnings can be attractive, the gig economy leaves participants vulnerable to a shift in demand, with no protections, transferable skills, or safety nets, while benefiting AI companies that capture the enduring value.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Anomalous Experiences<\/strong>: Stories like Jacobus Louw&#8217;s and Ramelio Hill&#8217;s reveal the complex implications of sharing data, from earning a spa training course to selling private phone chats, highlighting both financial benefits and existential risks.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><strong>Legal Ambiguities<\/strong>: There are significant risks regarding the lack of clarity in terms of data use, agreements permitting almost unlimited usage, and potential legal ramifications that can&#8217;t be easily reversed or renegotiated.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thousands of people are selling their identities to train AI \u2013 but at what cost?&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":197988,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/37aa4ed3e3c7a8e2e56b889f7f1edb0ae735019e\/0_0_800_640\/master\/800.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&precrop=40:21,offset-x50,offset-y0&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=3ca48867d768b175319b76b2aab23420","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[20],"class_list":["post-197987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197987"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197987"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":197989,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197987\/revisions\/197989"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}