Discord announces indexing of public server messages in search

The change will affect only servers from the Server Discovery directory. According to the company, there are more than 63,000 such communities. As Kod.ru specifies, they have at least 1,000 members, have been operating for at least eight weeks, and can be joined without an invite. Private servers, direct messages, and group chats will not be affected by the changes.

Starting November 16, each such server will receive a dedicated web page with a description and automated summaries of discussions from open channels. From mid-December, individual messages will begin appearing on these pages and in search results. The rollout will be gradual, the company cautions. Authors' names and avatars will not be displayed. 3DNews, citing Mashable, writes that these messages can be read via Google without a Discord account.

Administrators can remove individual channels or the entire server from search under Server Settings → Web Presence, as well as turn off summaries. A user can opt out of having their messages displayed under User Settings → Data and Privacy, though they will still be included in channel summaries. In the EU, the UK, Canada, Brazil, Australia, and South Korea, message display is turned off by default due to legal restrictions. The feature is unavailable to teens.

The announcement sparked criticism. As Habr writes, some users fear that their words will be seen by people outside the original context, while others question whether these discussions will become training material for AI models.