OpenAI has decided to disable the indexing of ChatGPT dialogues made public after a wave of criticism regarding the leakage of confidential data. This was announced by the chief security officer, Dain Staki, on social media.
This concerns a feature that allowed search engines to index conversations created by users in public mode. Examples of dialogues appeared on social media, where users allegedly confessed to illegal activities or disclosed business secrets. This information could show up in Google search results if published via the public sharing chat feature.
According to Staki, indexing of such pages will be blocked starting August 2, 2025. OpenAI is also exploring additional steps to restrict access to materials inadvertently made public by users.
The chat sharing feature was introduced in 2023 as a way to share interesting or educational examples of interaction with ChatGPT. However, the company did not foresee the extent to which public links could spread or be discovered through search engines.
Additionally, it is worth noting that OpenAI recently introduced a new feature in ChatGPT — Study Mode, which allows users to solve problems step by step.
