Google wins $10M bid for Spirit Airlines employee internal data

Published Aug 18, 03:38 PM UTC

Google won a bankruptcy auction to acquire Spirit Airlines' internal data for $10 million, including emails, 500 million Teams messages, workflows, and codebase, but excluding customer data. The deal, revealed in an August 14 court filing, underscores that employee-generated digital content belongs to employers and can be sold, especially as AI training data becomes valuable. Spirit, which ceased flights in May 2025, employed about 9,700 workers. Employment attorneys advise workers to assume all work communications are company property, to ask about data retention policies, and to avoid using work devices for personal tasks. Sensitive personal information like Social Security numbers remains protected by state laws even in bankruptcy.