Apple trained its new Siri on a partnership with Google. Let that sit for a moment. With iOS 27, Apple has finally pushed out its long-delayed Siri redesign, and while the assistant is genuinely smarter, it comes with a cost that deserves more scrutiny than the typical tech press coverage gives it. As reported by Engadget, the new Siri AI can index data across your apps, and it will sometimes send that data to remote servers for processing.
The mechanism behind this is a framework called App Intents. When you enable Siri AI, Spotlight and Siri merge into a single interface that, by default, searches through your Apple apps including Notes and Messages. If a third-party developer has chosen to support App Intents, Siri can scan their apps too. So the scope here is potentially wide.
What Apple says about your data, and why you should read the fine print
Apple says Siri AI uses a mix of on-device processing and its Private Cloud Compute infrastructure. The company claims it does not store data sent to PCC servers after processing, and that it cannot even see it. That’s a strong claim. But Apple also has a financial interest in you trusting that claim, and independent verification of PCC privacy guarantees remains limited. Still, on-device processing is a real privacy advantage compared to how most AI assistants work, so it’s not all bad news.
Separately, during iPhone setup, you may have accidentally opted into sharing Siri recordings with Apple for model training. That’s worth checking immediately.
How to actually limit what Siri can access
You have more control than Apple’s default settings suggest. Here are the key steps to tighten things up:
- To stop Siri from indexing a specific app, go to Settings, tap Apps, select the app, tap Search, then toggle off “Show Content in Search”.
- To stop sharing your Siri recordings, go to Settings, then Privacy and Security, then Analytics and Improvements, and disable “Improve Siri and Dictation”.
- To revert to the older Siri, go to Settings, tap Screen Time, then Content and Privacy Restrictions, enable that toggle, tap Siri, and select “Siri Classic” under Allowed Siri Version.
- To disable Siri entirely, go to Settings, tap Siri, scroll down and select “Turn off Siri”.
The broader pattern worth paying attention to
This isn’t an Apple-specific problem. Every major AI assistant is pushing toward deeper access to personal data because that’s what makes these tools feel useful. The more context the assistant has, the better it performs. But that access comes at a privacy cost that companies consistently frame as a feature rather than a trade-off.
Apple’s on-device processing approach is better than most. But “better than the alternative” is a low bar. So check your settings, decide what you’re comfortable sharing, and don’t assume Apple’s defaults were chosen with your privacy as the top priority. They weren’t.