Google has acquired the data of failed US airline Spirit

谷歌已收购破产的美国精神航空（Spirit）的数据

Google has acquired the data of failed US airline Spirit. Spirit hit financial turbulence when COVID-19 blew in during 2020 and started making losses. Its balance sheet never climbed back to a safe altitude and in May 2026 the airline grounded itself permanently.

谷歌已收购了破产的美国精神航空（Spirit）的数据。2020年新冠疫情爆发后，精神航空陷入财务困境并开始亏损。其资产负债表始终未能恢复到安全水平，最终于2026年5月永久停飞。

The low-cost carrier entered liquidation to wind itself up and is now auctioning assets to raise cash and settle at least some of its debts. A court document filed last week reveals that one of the assets up for sale is a huge trove of deidentified data, which Google bid for and won for just $10 million.

这家廉价航空公司进入清算程序以结束运营，目前正在拍卖资产以筹集现金并偿还部分债务。上周提交的一份法庭文件显示，待售资产中包括一个庞大的去标识化数据集，谷歌以1000万美元的价格竞标成功。

For that sum, Google bought itself 100 million emails and 500 million items from Microsoft Teams, 17 million OneDrive files and 20.5 million items from SharePoint. The search giant also now owns over 30 million recorded customer service calls, and more than 15 million customer service chat records.

通过这笔交易，谷歌获得了1亿封电子邮件、5亿条Microsoft Teams记录、1700万个OneDrive文件以及2050万条SharePoint记录。这家搜索巨头现在还拥有超过3000万条客户服务通话录音，以及超过1500万条客户服务聊天记录。

600,000 ServiceNow tickets are another element of the collection, along with 13.7 million active emails addresses from Oracle’s Responsys marketing application, and details of 11 million sales of in-flight Wi-Fi services. There’s also operational data in the trove, describing over 763,000 flights, five million crew pairings, more than 1.2 million fuel slips, and records describing purchases of 787,452 parts.

该数据集还包含60万张ServiceNow工单、来自甲骨文（Oracle）Responsys营销应用的1370万个活跃电子邮件地址，以及1100万笔机上Wi-Fi服务的销售详情。此外，数据中还包含运营数据，涵盖超过76.3万次航班、500万次机组人员排班、超过120万张燃油单据，以及787,452份零部件采购记录。

Google has reportedly said it bought the data to improve its AI services. The underbidder was Mercor, a company that provides data to train AI models. So clearly Spirit’s data is of value to AI companies. Indeed, The Register recently reported how AI experts increasingly believe large language models are blunt instruments, and that smaller models trained on specific fields of knowledge are more useful in some applications.

据报道，谷歌表示购买这些数据是为了改进其人工智能服务。竞标失败者是Mercor，这是一家为AI模型提供训练数据的公司。显然，精神航空的数据对AI公司具有价值。事实上，《The Register》最近报道称，AI专家越来越认为大语言模型是“钝器”，而在某些应用场景中，针对特定知识领域训练的小型模型更为实用。

Google might have itself the basis for an aviation ops model, or just with all sorts of quotidian financial records that could be useful for another AI. If you’ve flown Spirit and worry that Google will soon know about a testy conversation you had with the airline’s call center, you’re being told not to worry. The court filing says the data was deidentified before being put on sale and Google has promised to scrub any PII (Personally Identifiable Information) it finds in the trove.

谷歌可能已经获得了构建航空运营模型的基础，或者仅仅是利用这些日常财务记录来辅助其他AI模型。如果你曾乘坐过精神航空的航班，并担心谷歌会获知你与航空公司客服中心的不愉快对话，官方表示不必担心。法庭文件称，这些数据在出售前已进行去标识化处理，且谷歌承诺会清除在数据集中发现的任何个人身份信息（PII）。

The Register awaits evidence of the inevitable SNAFUs that mean some personal info appears as the result of a future prompt, or search. Fasten your seat belts!

《The Register》将持续关注未来是否会出现因系统失误（SNAFU）导致个人信息在搜索或提示词结果中泄露的情况。请系好安全带！