By: Chris Gaskins and Dominick Romano

A common misconception in the AI world is that if you pay for the product, you are the customer. If you use it for free, you are the product. For cloud based AI, that rule is broken.

If you are paying $20/month for ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, or Gemini Advanced, you are still likely training their models by default. This guide breaks down the privacy landscape into three distinct tiers: Free, Paid Individual, and Business Team.

Typical AI User Tier Comparison

Most confusion comes from the middle column (“Paid Individual”). Notice how it looks almost identical to the “Free” column.

Feature	Free Plans (Consumer)	Paid Individual (Plus / Pro / Advanced)	Business Plans (Team / Enterprise)
Default Data Training	YES	YES (The Trap)	NO
Human Review?	YES	YES	NO
Data Retention	Standard / Long-term	Standard / Long-term	Zero Retention (often configurable)
Privacy Status	Low	Low (Must opt-out manually)	High (Contractually protected)
Target Audience	Casual users	Power users / Freelancers	Companies / Businesses

Key Takeaways:

• Expect little to no privacy with Free Plans.
• Upgrading to a “Pro” account usually buys you features (faster models, image generation), not privacy.
• Paid Individual Plans typically require an explicit action by the user to opt-out of data training.

Deep Dive: Provider by Provider

1. OpenAI (ChatGPT)

• Free: Defaults to training on your data. You can opt out.
• Paid Individual (Plus): WARNING. Defaults to training on your data. Even if you pay $20/month, your chats are used to train GPT models unless you manually go to Settings > Data Controls and opt out.
• Business (Team/Enterprise): Safe. Training is OFF by default. OpenAI explicitly states they do not train on Team/Enterprise data.

2. Google (Gemini)

• Free (Consumer): Defaults to training with human review. To stop it, you must disable “Gemini Apps Activity,” which forces you to lose your chat history.
• Paid Individual (Gemini Advanced / Google One): WARNING. Same as Free. Your data is treated as consumer data. You still face the “Privacy vs. History” trade-off.
• Business (Gemini for Workspace): Safe. If you access Gemini via a paid Google Workspace business account, your data is treated like Workspace Gmail or Drive data—private and never used for training.

3. Anthropic (Claude)

• Free: Defaults to training (as of late 2024/2025).
• Paid Individual (Claude Pro): WARNING. Defaults to training. Anthropic’s policy groups “Pro” with “Free” regarding data usage. You must manually opt out in settings to prevent your data from being held for up to 5 years.
• Business (Claude Team): Safe. Training is strictly prohibited by default.

4. xAI (Grok)

• Paid Individual (Premium): WARNING. Grok is currently only available to paid users (Premium/Premium+), yet it still defaults to aggressive training, including scraping your X (Twitter) posts. Paying here offers no default privacy shield.
• Business: Enterprise tiers exist but are less common. Assume any Grok usage is non-private unless explicitly contracted otherwise.

Free Accounts: Who Tracks What?

This table compares the default policies for Standard/Consumer accounts (Free/Plus/Pro). This is where the subtle differences in “Retention” and “History” expose the real winners and losers.

Feature	OpenAI (ChatGPT)	Google (Gemini)	Anthropic (Claude)	xAI (Grok)
Default Training?	YES (Opt-out available)	YES (Opt-out available*)	YES (Opt-out available)	YES (Aggressive)
History Policy	Flexible Can keep History ON while Training is OFF.	Restrictive Must turn History OFF to stop Training.	Restrictive If Training is OFF, data is deleted in ~30 days.	Standard Linked to X account.
Social Media Scraping	No	No	No	YES (Public X posts)
Data Retention	Indefinite (until deleted); 30 days after deletion.	18 months (default) up to 3 years if human-reviewed.	5 Years (if Training ON) ~30 Days (if Training OFF).	Indefinite
Human Review	Rare (anonymized samples).	Frequent (Routine part of improvement).	Occasional	Vague

Critical Note: Notice the difference in retention. OpenAI is the only provider that allows you to keep your chat history indefinitely without consenting to model training. Anthropic and Google generally force you to choose: keep your history (and be trained on) or get privacy (and lose your history/long-term memory).

Opt-Out Settings Location:

• OpenAI ChatGPT = Settings -> Data Controls
• Google Gemini = Google Account -> Activity Controls
• Anthropic Claude = Profile -> Privacy Settings
• xAI (Grok) = X -> Settings

Privacy Risk Spectrum

The five privacy exposures from the table above were rated 0 (no risk) to 10 (maximum risk) then totaled to produce the overall privacy risk score.

Wait! Another Option: Use the API

Using the API (Application Programming Interface) is significantly safer than using the standard web chat.

Why the API is Different

When you use the website, you are a “Consumer.” When you use the API, you are a “Developer/Business.” The rules change completely.

• OpenAI API: Data sent via the API is NOT used for training by default. Retention is strictly limited (usually 30 days for abuse monitoring) unless you are on an Enterprise Zero Data Retention (ZDR) plan.
• Anthropic API: Commercial/API data is explicitly excluded from training. The 5-year retention rule for free users does not apply here.
• Google Vertex AI (Gemini): If you access Gemini through Google Cloud (Vertex AI), Google contractually guarantees your data is not used to train their foundation models.

Web vs. API Comparison

Feature	Web Interface (Plus / Pro / Advanced)	API (Developer Access)
Default Training	YES (Unless you opt out)	NO (Private by default)
Data Retention	Indefinite / Long-term	~30 Days (Abuse monitoring only)
Cost Model	Flat Monthly Fee ($20)	Pay-per-token (Pay for what you use)
Privacy Tier	Consumer Level	Enterprise Level

Recommendations Summary

1. For Freelancers & Solopreneurs

• Don’t assume “Pro” protects you. If you use ChatGPT Plus or Claude Pro for client work, you must manually go into settings and disable training. If you don’t, you are potentially exposing client secrets to OpenAI or Anthropic.
• The “Zero-History” Rule: If you use Gemini Advanced for sensitive work, you must turn off “Gemini Apps Activity” and accept that you won’t have a chat history.

2. For Business Owners

• Stop Reimbursing “Plus” Accounts. If your employees are being reimbursed for personal AI subscriptions being used for work, you are paying for data exposure.
• Mandate “Team” Accounts. Force the switch to ChatGPT Team or Claude Team. The cost is slightly higher ($25-30/user), but it is the only way to contractually ensure your company data stays out of the public model.

2. Use the API

• Use Model APIs. API’s provide Enterprise-grade privacy for a fraction of the cost.

Drainpipe Can Help

The Drainpipe Platform is specifically designed to address the issue of privacy. All communications between the Drainpipe Platform and the various AI Providers use the enterprise API calls.  This means that not only do you remain anonymous to the Model Provider, your information is kept private.  Furthermore, the Drainpipe platform provides a pay-as-you-go pricing plan so you only pay for what you consume.

You can easily get started today with a no cost trial that does not require a credit card.  Click the button below to learn more about Drainpipe Platform.