> Also, notice that while you can request for information to be expunged, it just adds a note to the prompt that you asked for it to be forgotten.

Are you inferring that from the is_redaction_request flag you quoted? Or did you do some additional tests? It seems possible that there could be multiple redaction mechanisms.

▲

spijdar 2 hours ago | parent [-]

That and part of the instructions referring to user commands to forget. I replied to another comment with the specifics.

It is certainly possible there are other redaction mechanisms -- but if that's the case, why is Gemini not redacting "prohibited content" from the user_context block of its prompt?

Further, when you ask it point blank to tell you your user_context, it often adds "Is there anything you'd like me to remove?", in my experience. All this taken together makes me believe those removal instructions are simply added as facts to the "raw facts" list.

▲

gruez 2 hours ago | parent [-]

>Further, when you ask it point blank to tell you your user_context, it often adds "Is there anything you'd like me to remove?", in my experience. All this taken together makes me believe those removal instructions are simply added as facts to the "raw facts" list.

Why would you tell the chatbot to forget stuff for you, when google themselves have a dedicated delete option?

>You can find and delete your past chats in Your Gemini Apps Activity.

https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/15637730?hl=en&co=G...

I suspect "ask chatbot to delete stuff for you" isn't really guaranteed to work, similar to how logging out of a site doesn't mean the site completely forgets about you. At most it should be used for low level security stuff like "forget that I planned this surprise birthday party!" or whatever.

	▲	spijdar 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		That settings menu gives you two relevant options: 1. The ability to delete specific conversations, 2. The ability to not use "conversation memory" at all. It doesn't provide the ability to forget specific details that might be spread over multiple conversations, including details it will explicitly not tell you about, while still remembering. That's the point -- not that it's using summaries of user conversations for memory purposes (which is explicitly communicated), but that if you tell it "Forget about <X>", it will feign compliance, without actually removing that data. Your only "real" options are all-or-nothing: have no memories at all, or have all your conversations collated into an opaque `user_context` which you have no insight or control over. That's the weird part. Obviously, Google is storing copies of all conversations (unless you disable history altogether). That's expected. What I don't expect is this strange inclusion of "prohibited" or "deleted" data within the system prompt of every new conversation.