Since its November 2022 launch, ChatGPT has become one of the fastest-growing digital platforms in history, surpassing 700 million weekly users (OpenAI, 2025a). This powerful language model can respond to almost any question or request in natural, human-like text. But behind the convenience lies a seriously overlooked concern: privacy and data security.
Every day, ChatGPT and other AI tools process millions of prompts. These tools learn from and store user interactions, sometimes including personal information. It raises questions about how this data is collected and used. This blog post talks about the main privacy issues with ChatGPT, explains how OpenAI uses user data, and gives some advice on how you can keep your own data safe.
How ChatGPT Collects and Uses Data
According to OpenAI’s Privacy Policy, as of October 2025, the company collects several types of personal data when you use its services (OpenAI, 2025b). These include:
- Account details such as your name, email address, and any third-party accounts you connect to your subscription.
- Prompt content, meaning anything you type or upload (text, files, and/or images).
- Technical data like your IP address, browser device type, operating system, and location (based on your IP).
OpenAI uses this information to provide, maintain, and improve its services, detect fraud or misuse, comply with legal requirements, and develop new features (OpenAI, 2025b). While these uses are common in many online platforms, the sensitive nature of ChatGPT interactions (often involving creative ideas, business data, or personal details) makes data handling particularly delicate.
Sharing personal information (such as names, contact details, or medical data) or confidential business information (such as client records, financial data, or proprietary ideas) through platforms like ChatGPT without proper authorisation can amount to a confidentiality breach and, in many cases, a personal data breach under data protection law (Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens, 2025; ICO, n.d.).
Key Privacy Concerns Around ChatGPT
Here are five of the main risks users should be aware of:
1. Your content may have been used to train ChatGPT
ChatGPT was trained on a vast amount of open web text from the internet, including websites, articles, forums, open data sets, and books (Heaven, 2023). While there is no individual consent process for collecting publicly available online texts, it does raise legal and ethical questions about collecting such data. An internet user should always be aware of what is put online and made public.
2. ChatGPT collects extensive user data
To use ChatGPT, you must create an account. That means OpenAI receives identifying information before you even start using the tool. The combination of IP tracking, cookies, and content logs is a signal of high profiling risks.
3. Your chats can be used for model training
OpenAI has stated that user conversations may be reviewed to help improve model performance. In practice, this means that something you type, even unintentionally, could become part of future model training data. This has led to cases like Samsung, where employees accidentally leaked sensitive source code (debug errors and summarise transcripts) while using ChatGPT for work (Ray, 2023).
4. ChatGPT may share data with third parties
OpenAI will share personal data with service providers, affiliates, or legal authorities in certain circumstances, for example, during audits, investigations, or when required by law (OpenAI, 2025b). While this is standard practice in big tech, it highlights how once data leaves the chat environment, users lose direct control over where it goes and who may process it.
5. Data leaks can happen
In March 2023, OpenAI experienced a data breach due to a bug in its system. Some users were able to see others’ chat histories and partial payment details (OpenAI, 2023). The breach was closed in 9 hours and affected roughly 1.2% of ChatGPT Plus users (OpenAI, 2023).
Privacy Issues for European Users
For users in the European Economic Area (EEA), the UK, and Switzerland, OpenAI provides a specific privacy policy to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This policy grants you rights such as (GDPR, n.d.):
- Accessing your personal data (Art. 15)
- Requesting corrections or deletion (Art. 16 – 17)
- Limiting or objecting to processing (Art. 18, 19, and 21)
- Requesting data portability (Art. 20)
These rights are designed to give users more control over their personal information, so people can check what data is held about them and ensure that it is accurate and used fairly. They help ensure transparency and fairness when AI tools like ChatGPT process user data.
To exercise these rights, you can contact OpenAI via their Data Rights Portal or by emailing dsar@openai.com. For additional assistance with this process, you can find more help here.
How to Protect Your Privacy When Using ChatGPT
While ChatGPT takes measures to secure user data, you can also take steps to reduce your own risk:
- Avoid sharing personal or sensitive information. Don’t include unnecessary personal details and, absolutely, no confidential work details in prompts.
- Request data deletion. If you want to remove your data, fill out OpenAI’s deletion request form through their privacy portal.
- Limit consent. You can ask OpenAI not to use your chats for model training.
Settings > Data controls > Improve the model for everyone > Off
- Use a VPN (Virtual Private Network). A VPN hides your IP address, preventing ChatGPT from identifying your location.
Final Thoughts
ChatGPT is an amazing and widely used tool, but it is not risk-free. Using it responsibly means staying aware of how your data may be collected, stored, and shared.
AI thrives on information – make sure you decide which information it gets.
Sources:
Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens. (2025). What is a data breach? https://www.autoriteitpersoonsgegevens.nl/en/themes/security/data-breaches/what-is-a-data-breach
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). (n.d.). General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) – legal text. https://gdpr-info.eu/
Heaven, W. D. (2023). The inside story of how ChatGPT was built from the people who made it. MIT Technology Review. https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/03/03/1069311/inside-story-oral-history-how-chatgpt-built-openai/
ICO. (n.d.). Personal data breaches: a guide. https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/report-a-breach/personal-data-breach/personal-data-breaches-a-guide/#whatisa
OpenAI. (2023) March 20 ChatGPT outage: Here’s what happened. https://openai.com/index/march-20-chatgpt-outage/
OpenAI. (2025a). How people are using ChatGPT. https://openai.com/index/how-people-are-using-chatgpt/
OpenAI. (2025b). Privacy statement. https://openai.com/nl-NL/policies/row-privacy-policy/
Ray, S. (2023). Samsung bans ChatGPT among employees after sensitive code leak. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2023/05/02/samsung-bans-chatgpt-and-other-chatbots-for-employees-after-sensitive-code-leak/
