A US court ruling obliges OpenAI to store almost all of its users' ChatGPT conversations - including those they thought were permanently deleted, The Hill reports.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein in Manhattan upheld a preliminary injunction requiring OpenAI to retain all user data as evidence in a copyright infringement lawsuit brought by The New York Times against the company. The ruling would require OpenAI to retain billions of chats, shattering the notion of privacy for ChatGPT’s more than 70 million users.
Users often share extremely personal information with ChatGPT, from medical issues and relationship problems to deep psychological experiences, hoping that their data will be permanently deleted upon request. However, a January court order ordered OpenAI to retain “all original data that would otherwise have been deleted” while the case is being heard.
Last week, Judge Stein upheld that claim, saying it was “presumably reasonable” to assume that some users were deleting chats to cover up copyright infringement. He also ruled that keeping deleted chats did not violate OpenAI’s privacy policy, which allows for data retention to comply with legal obligations.
The decision has drawn sharp criticism from human rights activists who say it amounts to mass data collection without users' consent. Experts warn that it sets a dangerous precedent, allowing any plaintiff to demand the retention of data on millions of unrelated people to bolster their case.
Many ChatGPT users are particularly concerned about the intimate nature of their conversations. At the same time, they have no real mechanisms to challenge the use of their data in this case, and attempts by individuals to intervene have been rejected by the courts.
The New York Times insists that preserving deleted chats is necessary because users may have deleted them to hide copyright infringement. Privacy advocates argue that most users delete chats for personal safety reasons, not to break the law.
Critics say the newspaper, which once exposed mass surveillance programs, is now demanding the creation of "a database the NSA would only dream of" in order to win a copyright case.