Using AI Safely and Privately
AI is part of everyday life. This short, free course gives you the calm, practical habits to use any AI tool without giving away your privacy, getting fooled by confident wrong answers, or falling for AI-powered scams — no technical background required.
AI assistants are now everywhere — on your phone, at your job, in your family group chat. This free, plain-language course is for everyday users who want to enjoy them without the worry. You will learn exactly what is safe and unsafe to type into a chatbot, how your conversations may be used to train AI and how to turn that off, and why you should verify important answers before you rely on them. You will also learn about newer risks in clear, non-technical terms: prompt injection (when a webpage or document secretly tells the AI what to do), why connected AI assistants and agents raise the stakes, and how scammers use AI for sharper phishing and convincing voice-clone calls — plus the simple family safe word that defeats them. A dedicated module covers using AI safely at work without leaking company data. The tone is calm and empowering, never alarmist. Because tools and settings change constantly, the course teaches durable principles and shows you how to check the current settings and policies of whatever tool you use, rather than memorizing menus that will be out of date next month. You will finish with a short personal checklist of AI safety habits you can apply automatically.
What you'll be able to do
- Decide confidently what is safe and what is unsafe to type into a consumer AI chatbot
- Find and adjust the settings that control whether your chats are used for training, and know why to verify them per tool
- Recognize prompt injection and understand why connected AI assistants and agents raise the stakes
- Verify AI answers before relying on them for legal, medical, or financial decisions
- Spot AI-powered scams — phishing and voice clones — and protect yourself and your family with simple habits
Curriculum
Module 1: What to Share (and Not Share) with AI
FreeWhat is safe versus unsafe to type into a chatbot, what happens to your conversations and how to opt out of training, and the everyday privacy habits that keep your footprint small.
Module 2: Trusting AI Answers
FreeWhy confident AI can still be wrong, how to verify high-stakes answers, and two newer risks explained simply — prompt injection and the higher stakes of connected AI and agents.
Module 3: AI-Enabled Scams
FreeHow scammers use AI for sharper phishing and convincing voice-clone calls, and the simple, durable habits — including a family safe word — that defeat them.
Module 4: AI at Work and Your Safety Plan
FreeUsing AI at work without leaking company data or falling into shadow AI, plus a personal checklist of AI safety habits to carry forward.
This entire course is free.
Every lesson is free — no purchase needed. When you're ready to go deeper for your job, field, or a specific skill, explore the full catalog.