Twitch sparks gamers’ wrath with Amazon AI sharing deal

Twitch, the popular livestream gaming platform, has sparked outrage among its millions of users after announcing it will share their data with parent company Amazon to enhance the retailer's AI models. The decision has reignited the ongoing debate about online privacy preservation in an era where artificial intelligence firms are increasingly seeking data to improve their algorithms.

Twitch explained to users on X that individuals would have the choice to opt-out of the data-sharing process. However, the platform will still collect and use people's live audio, text, images, and other content from its channels for AI training across all Amazon platforms. During a live chat on the platform, Twitch's chief product officer Mike Minton acknowledged the controversy, stating that the data sharing would be opted in by default, as it is standard practice for most content services.

The move has been met with widespread criticism, with gamers accusing Twitch of an unethical infringement on their privacy. Some users have even suggested that the company should be compensated for using their services in the AI training process. This announcement follows a similar policy shift by Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, which announced last year that public comments on its platforms, with the exception of WhatsApp, would be used to train its AI models unless users opted out.