Bankruptcy Court Pushes Back Hearing on Google's Spirit Data Deal

A U.S. bankruptcy court has postponed a hearing to approve the sale of internal business data from bankrupt Spirit Airlines to Alphabet's Google for $10 million. The hearing, initially set for Wednesday, has been rescheduled for September 9.

The adjournment follows an objection filed by the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), the union representing Spirit's cabin crew. The data involved in the proposed sale includes employee emails, Microsoft Teams messages, spreadsheets, calendars, and marketing, productivity, and operations data. Google intends to use this information for product development and training its AI models.

The AFA is seeking restrictions on the sale of flight attendant data and additional protections for employees should the transaction be approved. Spirit has stated that the records would be de-identified and would not contain customer or personally identifiable information.

However, the union has expressed concerns that, because the sale agreement requires preserving links across datasets, information about individuals or small groups could potentially be reconstructed. Spirit is selling off assets in bankruptcy after ceasing operations in May, citing high debt and fuel costs.