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America.gov

778 points · 742 comments · plesiv

  1. jayturley · · focus · HN ↗
    Privacy: "Your messages aren’t saved by America.gov, and your chat disappears when you leave. Some answers may be cached for up to two hours."

    What about the model? My understanding is those queries are saved by the model provider.

    Given this administration, and the privacy issues with the official WH app, this feels very misleading.

    1. bb123 · · focus · HN ↗
      Not necessarily - there are tons of zero data retention (ZDR) model hosting options, including big players like Amazon.
      1. echelon · · focus · HN ↗
        You can use all the flagship models on Amazon Bedrock and have a contractually obligated air gap between your data and the model providers.
        1. birdsongs · · focus · HN ↗
          How do you air gap between a model and the data it needs to operate?
          1. scottyah · · focus · HN ↗
            Not sure, why do you ask?
            1. birdsongs · · focus · HN ↗
              Because an air gap is a literal air gap, no networking, disconnected systems. It's not possible for models to function, with my understanding of it?
              1. scottyah · · focus · HN ↗
                Oh they can, no problem. You just download (transfer data for) the weights and whatever you want running it.

                You can install Gemma4 on ollama on your own computer and try it out! Lots of examples of people coding with no internet using qwen on flights etc.

          2. johncolanduoni · · focus · HN ↗
            I wouldn’t call it an air gap, but when you use a model on Bedrock or Vertex the inference runs on Amazon or Google’s servers respectively. The model provider gives them the weights, and is not otherwise in the loop for serving individual requests.
    2. TZubiri · · focus · HN ↗
      Often not, vendors like OpenAI or OpenAI through Azure might retain messages for safety reasons if they activate some safety filter, but it won't use it for training.
    3. Cyan488 · · focus · HN ↗
      The cynic in me thinks this will end up being a honeypot for anyone asking sensitive immigration or tax questions.
    4. SamInTheShell · · focus · HN ↗
      The harness was censored overnight as well. Can't ask it who won the 2020 election or who was the president in 2020 or 2000. It will say who is president right now though. Crazy shit really.
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