1. Website Planet
  2. >
  3. News
  4. >
  5. ChatGPT Bug Leaks Sensitive User Data
ChatGPT Bug Leaks Sensitive User Data

ChatGPT Bug Leaks Sensitive User Data

Ivana Shteriova Ivana Shteriova
Earlier this week, a ChatGPT bug exposed sensitive user data, including conversation histories, email addresses, and payment information to other users of the popular chatbot.

OpenAI temporarily shut down ChatGPT amid the issue, leaving a message on the chat history sidebar “History is temporarily unavailable.” The service is up and running again, and a few days later, OpenAI has issued an explanation.

“We took ChatGPT offline Monday to fix a bug in an open source library that allowed some users to see titles from other users’ chat history,” reads the company’s Twitter announcement. “Our investigation has also found that 1.2% of ChatGPT Plus users might have had personal data revealed to another user.”

Between 1:00 AM and 10:00 AM PT on March 20, user data exposed included first and last names, conversation titles and initial conversation messages, email and payment addresses, and the last four digits of credit card numbers and their expiration dates. OpenAI assured the public that “full credit card numbers were not exposed at any time.”

Users that visited their “Manage subscription” section during the affected hours may have glimpsed information belonging to other ChatGPT Plus users who were actively using the chatbot at that time. The bug also caused some subscription confirmation emails to end up in the wrong mailboxes. These emails included the last four digits of credit card numbers.

It took nine hours for OpenAI to discover the bug in the open-source library called redis-py after a number of users took it to social media showing screenshots of the chatbot exposing information. Users won’t be able to access ChatGPT histories from these troublesome hours on Monday.

ChatGPT’s leak of sensitive information is yet another reminder that AI systems should be approached with caution. The popular chatbot made mistakes during its Bing demo, and like any other AI tool, it’s prone to producing fabricated data that sounds accurate. Unlike the bug, which was completely out of users’ control, these are instances when users can fix things by fact-checking the generated results.

OpenAI’s FAQ site also warns that ChatGPT can’t keep secrets and asks users to refrain from sharing confidential information in their conversations with the tool. Prompts from histories can’t be deleted and are very likely to be used for future training. OpenAI is relying on user activity and feedback to improve the technology behind ChatGPT. Recently, the company released its most powerful version yet, which is currently available only to ChatGPT Plus subscribers.

Ivana Shteriova
Ivana Shteriova
Ivana is a full-time content writer and expert reviewer passionate about tech, finance, business, and too many other things to name. After getting her bachelor’s degree in Economics, she decided to ditch a career in accounting and turn her passion into a full-time writing affair. You can find her listening to finance podcasts, reading self-help books, glamming up, and rocking bold outfits. She’s also advocating for animal welfare and women’s rights.

Follow our experts on
Rate this Article
5.0 Voted by 2 users
You already voted! Undo
This field is required Maximal length of comment is equal 80000 chars Minimal length of comment is equal 10 chars
Any comments?
Reply
View %s replies
View %s reply
More news
Show more
Reply to
0 out of minimum 50 characters
Complete your reply Complete your comment
The name is too short The name is too long The name contains invalid characters
The email is required The email is incorrect
Thank you, - your comment was submitted successfully!
We check all user comments within 48 hours to make sure they are from real people like you. We're glad you found this article useful - we would appreciate it if you let more people know about it.
Popup final window
Share this blog post with friends and co-workers right now:
Thank you, , your comment was submitted successfully!

We check all comments within 48 hours to make sure they're from real users like you. In the meantime, you can share your comment with others to let more people know what you think.

Thank you for signing up!

Once a month you will receive interesting, insightful tips, tricks, and advice to improve your website performance and reach your digital marketing goals!

So happy you liked it!

Share it with your friends!

<

Or review us on

3004614
50
5000
55906199