Apple is preparing to roll out an over-the-air Siri update that will automatically delete user conversation logs after 24 hours, according to techcrunch.com. The change, expected to ship with iOS 18.4 in March 2025, covers voice and text interactions handled by the assistant.
The feature was green-lit after a six-month internal review led by Apple’s privacy engineering team, sources told techcrunch.com. Engineers built a new on-device retention layer that purges raw audio and transcripts once the daily window closes, while still allowing the system to retain anonymized model-training data. The same mechanism will apply to Siri interactions on iPadOS, macOS, watchOS and the forthcoming visionOS 2.3 update, the report added.
The move positions Apple ahead of Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa, both of which store user queries for months unless manually deleted, according to techcrunch.com. Privacy regulators in the EU have already fined Meta €1.2 billion for similar data-retention practices, and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission is weighing comparable rules for voice assistants. By shortening the retention window, Apple aims to deflect antitrust scrutiny while differentiating its devices in enterprise markets where data-residency requirements are tightening.
Developers seeded with iOS 18.4 beta 1 last week confirmed the toggle is enabled by default and cannot be overridden by third-party apps, techcrunch.com noted. Apple plans to publish updated privacy white papers ahead of the March release and will brief enterprise customers during its March 12 IT security webinar. Observers will watch whether the policy survives the final release candidate, expected the week of March 17.