Dead Startups Are Selling Your Old Slack Messages to AI Labs

According to MIT Technology Review, a booming secondary market is giving failed companies an unexpected afterlife. Specialized shutdown services like SimpleClosure and Sunset are now packaging and selling code bases, Slack histories, Notion docs, and emails directly to foundational AI labs.

How Dead Startup Data Powers AI

As noted by MIT Technology Review, AI labs are hitting a wall with public and synthetic datasets. To build better autonomous agents that handle complex tasks, companies like Surge AI buy real-world archives filled with actual human decisions, arguments, and judgment calls.

Founders are walking away with fast capital. Keelan Miskell netted roughly $25,000 for his defunct crypto startup's code and expects another $15,000 for workspace data in Slack, Figma, and Notion. At a much larger scale, Google outbid rivals to buy decades of data from Spirit Airlines' bankruptcy for $10 million—acquiring 100 million emails and 500 million Teams messages.

Passo a passo: what founders and workers face

While this market turns digital archives into cash, the mechanics and risks require a close look:

• Asset packaging: Undertaker firms value dying startups based on head count, operational years, and volume of internal communications.
• Scrubbing attempts: Data scientists attempt to filter out personally identifiable information and HR files before sale.
• The privacy trap: Legal experts interviewed by MIT Technology Review call the data 'legally radioactive,' as personal details like medical appointments and family plans routinely lurk in work calendars and chats.
• Captured capital: Financial windfalls flow directly to senior creditors and investors, leaving employees whose daily communications generated the value with nothing.

Veredito: should you worry about your data?

If you currently work at a startup under financial stress, your daily Slack messages and emails carry a secondary market price tag. With no federal laws explicitly banning these sales and founders lacking visibility into who buys the data, the 'Wild West' of AI training is quietly monetizing your workplace footprint without your consent.