Does ChatGPT save your personal data?
OpenAI’s ChatGPT still invokes a lot of emotions - both good and bad. Its benefits for businesses and private users go hand-in-hand with concerns about the privacy of sensitive data. If you are wondering if you should use this tool for your digital product, read on to learn what is ChatGPT’s current policy on handling data as well as what are our practices for working with this tool for Boldare.
Table of contents
The ChatGPT’s policy on saving data explained
The first question is, does ChatGPT save your data? The short answer is, yes. The data that OpenAI saves and posses includes:
- Account information - when you set up a ChatGPT account, OpenAI collects personal information, such as name, contact information, account credentials, payment card information, and transaction history.
- User content – when using ChatGPT, your input (prompts) and any file uploads are saved; plus any feedback you might provide.
- Social media-related – just like with any other brand, if you use any ChatGPT social media pages (Instagram, Facebook, Medium, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc.) information is saved.
And in more detail, when you interact with ChatGPT services, so-called ‘technical information’ is saved, including:
- log data - your IP address, browser type and settings, the date and time of your request, and how you interacted with our website,
- usage data - types of content that you view or engage with, the features you use and the actions you take, plus your time zone, country, and dates and times of access,
- device information - your device, operating system, and browser (depending on your device settings),
- cookies - again, depending on your settings.
Why does ChatGPT save your data?
Why does ChatGPT collect data that could potentially be used to identify users? According to OpenAI it’s because it helps improve the system, resulting in better, more useful AI interactions.
Unsurprisingly, ChatGPT users have raised questions about how their data is saved. Here is a selection of data-related FAQs, derived from OpenAI’s website (source):
- Will OpenAI use my conversations for training?
Yes, conversations may be reviewed by AI trainers to improve the system. However, the account settings include an option to opt out of saving chats in the account history for training use. However, unsaved chats are deleted within 30 days.
- Can I delete my data?
Yes, there are two ways for data deletion. Specific chats/conversations in ChatGPT can be cleared one at a time from chat history. The nuclear option is to delete your account (source).
- Can I delete specific prompts?
No, specific prompts cannot be deleted, only whole chats. OpenAI recommends you do not share sensitive information in your prompts.
In terms of data security, the ChatGPT conversations and other user data that are recorded are all encrypted and stored on US-based servers. But what use does OpenAI make of your data? According to OpenAI’s privacy policy, personal information will only be used in specific, limited circumstances:
- To provide, administer, maintain and/or analyze services;
- To improve services and conduct research;
- To communicate with users;
- To develop new products and services;
- To prevent fraud, criminal activity, or misuses of services, and to ensure the security of IT systems, architecture, and networks;
- To comply with legal obligations and legal process and to protect OpenAI’s rights, privacy, safety, or property, and/or that of affiliates, users, or other third parties.
Chat GPT user rights explained
So, what rights or control over their data do ChatGPT users have? Such rights depend on the territory in which the user is based, depending on the applicable legislation and regulations. For example, for the European Economic Area and UK these rights may include:
- Access to personal information
- Deletion of personal information (see above)
- Correction or updating of personal information
- Transfer of personal information
- Withdrawal of consent to processing of personal information Although this may affect your use of ChatGPT – e.g. the example above of setting your account to not save chat history, resulting in your chats not being part of the system’s training (source).
Turning off your chat history is a relatively new feature for users, introduced by OpenAI in April 2023. Once the chat history option is disabled, conversations will not be used to train or improve the ChatGPT model, nor will they appear in your chat history sidebar. Such conversations will be kept for 30 days at most and will only be accessed or reviewed if necessary to monitor for abuse. After that time they are permanently deleted.
What is our advice on working with OpenAI’s tool?
As we mentioned before, we are avoiding entering any personal or otherwise sensitive information, like lines of code, email addresses, phone numbers, physical addresses, company and product names. When working on our own, internal projects we often use ChatGPT through an API. This way, ChatGPT does not save data from our prompts to train the algorithm. Instead, that data is stored on a secure cloud used by the API.
Our research and development team is working on different AI-powered solutions that could enhance our product development process. However, our policy is not to use any AI-based tools in clients’ products without their knowledge or specific request.
Upcoming changes to data-handling
As of 25th of April 2023, OpenAI introduced two more features to ChatGPT (source). One of them is a new ‘business’ subscription option that will be available for professionals and enterprises, giving more control over your data and that of your end users (for example, if you have incorporated ChatGPT functionality into your digital product). In this option, end users’ data will not be used by default to train the model. The second one will be a new ‘export’ option is coming which will make it easier to export your data, including all your ChatGPT conversations.
So, does ChatGPT save your history and collect and store your data?
To return to the original question, the answer is clearly a ‘yes’. ChatGPT does collect and save your data. If you are considering using ChatGPT as part of your business systems or digital products, the upcoming business subscription option will offer even more control and, perhaps, peace of mind.
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