I have a Google Workspace account. As administrator you can disable Gemini for both the App and the Workspace.
To disable it for the Workspace requires that you disable it for each service in your Workspace.
If you have a starter or classroom edition, this functionality is not available, but Google support can make it visible.
As Administrator, click on Help, fight your way through the bot. I asked to “disable Gemini” and kept clicking “this does not help” when it came back.
Eventually you can start a chat with support.
It helps if you have a screenshot of the Gemini Workspace screen that shows there are no controls. Upload the screenshot into the chat.
The agent enabled the controls within a few minutes, so I could disable Gemini for each service. It’s now finally gone from Gmail on the web and my phone.
Be prepared to be told that Gemini can help you with your job … which I declined to engage with.
Source: I did this an hour ago after trying many times over the past three weeks.
I’ve just created a web page describing how to disable this:
Edit: Added link
Legit question: Why would someone want to disable Gemini?
I have absolutely no desire to have autocorrect on steroids actively participating in either my private or professional life.
The whole concept of the LLM is flawed. There is fundamentally no distinction between data and instruction, so a malicious document or email can be processed as legitimate input without the user ever being aware of it.
The level of ignorance in the general public around issues like this is absolutely gobsmacking and the behaviour of the breathless reporting by ignorant “journalists” is in my opinion borderline criminal.
I didn’t ask for Gemini, I didn’t want Gemini, I couldn’t disable it without jumping through hoops and there is no way for me to roll back any access it’s had over the past 25 days. Access I did not consent to, neither as an end user, nor as the administrator of my account.
If Gemini is so harmless and helpful, why not make it opt-in instead of opt-out, and why is opting out so awkward? Every few months I have to log in and opt-out from new crap I didn’t want and didn’t agree to. I’m very close to putting on my tinfoil hat and going full homeserver.
The sheer volume of spam that arrives every day is probably the single largest obstacle to doing this.
Coupled with the fact that an absurd amount of effort is required to get legitimate mail actually delivered and the security issues associated with running any service on the internet today makes for more than a full-time job in maintaining infrastructure alone, never mind getting paid to do actual work.
I cannot see myself going back to self hosting anything anytime soon.
