Understanding the limits of GitHub Copilot

By this point in the chapter, many readers are probably thinking “This is great, but can I actually use this in my job?” That’s a valid question, so let’s talk about the two common objections: privacy of source code and license concerns with public code.

Data privacy and GitHub Copilot

Many organizations considering GitHub Copilot are concerned that integrating an AI tool into their code editor means exposing their code to GitHub. Some also raise the potential that GitHub might even use the organization’s private code to generate new large language models in the future where these new models might generate code based on the organization’s proprietary logic.

These are valid concerns, and depending on which edition of GitHub Copilot you are using, there may be some basis for them.

With GitHub Copilot for Individuals, the prompts you send to GitHub Copilot, including surrounding code and Copilot...