Comment by 1vuio0pswjnm7
7 hours ago
"The New York Times is demanding that we turn over 20 million of your private ChatGPT conversations."
As might any plaintiff. NYT might be the first of many others and the lawsuits may not be limited to copyright claims
Why has OpenAI collected and stored 20 million conversations (including "deleted chats")
What is the purpose of OpenAI storing millions of private conversations
By contrast the purpose of NYT's request is both clear and limited
The documents requested are not being made public by the plaintiffs. The documents will presumably be redacted to protect any confidential information before being produced to the plaintiffs, the documents can only be used by the plaintiffs for the purpose of the litigation against OpenAI and, unlike OpenAI who has collected and stored these conversations for as long as OpenAI desires, the plaintiffs are prohibited from retaining copies of the documents after the litigation is concluded
The privacy issue here has been created by OpenAI for their own commercial benefit
It is not even clear what this benefit, if any, will be as OpenAI continues to search for a "business model"
Wanton data collection
NB. There is no order to "collect". The order is to preserve what is already being collected and stored in the ordinary course of business
https://ia801404.us.archive.org/31/items/gov.uscourts.nysd.6...
https://ia801404.us.archive.org/31/items/gov.uscourts.nysd.6...
Why does OpenAI collect and retain for 30 days^1 chats that the user wants to be deleted
It was doing this prior to being sued by the NYT and many others
OpenAI was collecting chats even when the user asked for deletion, i.e., the user did not want them saved
That's why a lawsuit could require OpenAi to issue a hold order, retain these chats for longer and produce them to another party in discovery
If OpenAI was not collecting these chats in the ordinary course of its business before being sued by the NYT and many others, then there would be no "deleted chats" for OpenAI to be compelled by court order to retain and produce to the plaintiffs
1. Or whatever period OpenAI decides on. It could change at any time for any reason. However OpenAI cannot change their retention policy to 0 days or some shortened period after being sued. Google tried this a few years ago. It began destroying chats between employees after Google was on notice it was going to be sued by the US government and state AGs
I'm not commenting on the core point of your comment, only the "why retain for 30 days" question.
Im an age of automated backups and failovers, deleting can be really hard. Part of the answer could simply be that syncing a delete across all the redundancies (while ensuring those redundancies are reliable when a disaster happens and they need to recover or maintain uptime) may take days to weeks. Also the 30 days could be the limit, as oppose to the average or median time it takes.
Maybe an append only data store where actual hard deletes only happen as an async batch job? Still 30 days seems really long for this.
The two documents you linked are responses to specific parts of OpenAI's objection. They're not good sources for the original order.
Nevertheless, you're generally correct but you don't realize why: A core feature of ChatGPT is that it keeps your conversation history right there so you can click on it, review it, and continue conversations across all of your devices. The court order is to preserve what is already present in the system even if the user asks to delete it.
For those who are confused: A core feature of ChatGPT and other LLM accounts is that your past conversations are available to return to, until you specifically delete them. The problem now is that if a user asks for the conversation to be deleted, OpenAI has to retain the conversation for the court order even though it appears deleted.
> What is the purpose of OpenAI storing millions of private conversations
Your previous ChatGPT conversations show up right in the ChatGPT interface.
They have to store the private conversations to enable users to bring them up in the interface.
This isn't a secretive, hidden data collection. It's a clear and obvious feature right in the product. They're fighting for the ability to not retain secret records of past conversations that have been deleted.
The problem with the court order is that it requires them to keep the conversations even after a user presses the 'Delete' button on them.
They could have been stored at the client, and encrypted before optionally synced back to OpenAI servers in a way that the stored chats can only be read back by the user. Signal illustrates how this is possible.
OpenAI made a choice in how the feature was and is implemented.
> Our long-term roadmap includes advanced security features designed to keep your data private, including client-side encryption for your messages with ChatGPT. We believe these features will help keep your private conversations private and inaccessible to anyone else, even OpenAI.
No it's not. It's literally a court order mandating them to collect this data.
- [1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/08/openai-offers-20...
This article says nothing of the sort. The court order is to preserve existing logs they already have, not to disable logging, and hand all the logs over the plaintiffs. OpenAI's objections are mainly that 1/there are too many logs (so they're proposing a sample instead) and that 2/there's identifying data in the logs and so they are being "forced" to anonymize the logs at their expense (even though it's what they want as a condition of transferring the logs).
There is nothing in the article that mentions OpenAI being forced to create new logs they don't already have.
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This is an excellent article and source. Thank you.
> What is the purpose of OpenAI storing millions of private conversations
Its needed for the conversation history feature, a core feature of the ChatGPT product
Its like saying "What is the purpose of Google Photos storing millions of private images"
This is true but why retain deleted conversations?
That's the objection: The court order requires them to retain everything they currently have, even if the user requests that it be deleted.
ChatGPT (the app) specifically says they keep deleted conversations for up to 30 days. That's probably why.
>What is the purpose of OpenAI storing millions of private conversations
Have you used ChatGPT? Your conversation history is on the left rail
"Have you used ChatGPT?"
No
Large number of upvotes on the quoted comment however. Maybe some of those voters are ChatGPT users
I do searching from the command line in text mode. The script I use keeps a "log" (a customised SERP) of all query strings and search result URLs. I also have these URLs stored in the logs from the forward proxy. These are compressed using RePair. I can search the compressed logs faster this way than with something like
or
They made the feature, now they get to live with it. So they can spare us the feigned surprise and outrage.
Instead of writing open letters they could of course do something about it. Even Google stopped storing your location timeline on their servers and now have it per-device only.
If an analogy to the history of search engines can be made,^1 then we know that log retention policies in the US can change over time. The user has no control over such changes
https://ide.mit.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/w23815.pdf
Companies operating popular www search engines might claim that the need for longer retention is "to provide better service" or some similar reason that focuses on users' interests rather than the company's interests^2
2. Generally, advertising services
This paper attempts to expose such claims as bogus
1. According to some reports OpenAI is sending some queries to Google
Is there a technical limitation that prevents chat histories from being stored locally on the user's computer instead of being stored on someone else's computer(s)
Why do chat histories need to be accessible by OpenAI, its service partners and anyone with the authority to request them from OpenAI
If users want this design, as suggested by HN commenters, if users want their chat histories to be accessible to OpenAI, its service providers and anyone with authority to request them from OpenAI, then wouldn't it also be true that these users are not much concerned with "privacy"
If so, then why would OpenAI proclaim they are "fighting the New York Times' invasion of user privacy", knowing that NYT is prohibited from making the logs public and users generally do not care much about "privacy" anyway
The restrictions on plaintiff NYT's use of the logs are greater than the restrictions, if any,^1 on OpenAI's use of them
1. If any such restrictions existed, for example if OpenAI stated "We don't do X" in a "privacy policy" and people interpreted this as a legally enforceable restriction,^2 how would a user verify that the statement was true, i.e., that OpenAI has not violated the "restriction". Silicon Valley companies like OpenAI are highly secretive
2. As opposed to a statement by OpenAi of what OpenAI allegedly does not do. Compare with a potentially legally-enforceable promise such as "OpenAI will not do X". Also consider that OpenAI may do Y, Z, etc. and make no mention of it to anyone. As it happens Silicon Valley companies generally have a reputation for dishonesty
Presumably for cross-device interactivity. If I interact with ChatGPT on my phone, then open it on my desktop. I might be a bit frustrated that I can't get to the chat I was having on my phone previously.
OpenAI could store the chat conversation in an encrypted format that only you, the user, can decrypt, with the client-side determining the amount of previous messages to include for additional context, but there's plenty of user overhead involved in an undertaking like that (likely a separate decryption password would be needed to ensure full user-exclusive access, etc).
I'd appreciate and use a feature like that, but I doubt most "average" users would care.
Facebook messenger tries to marry end to end encryption with multi-device access and it's a horrible mess with some messages not being delivered to some devices for hours , days or ever.
I absolutely want OpenAI to keep all of my chats and I absolutely don't want them to share them ( voluntarily or by force) with any private agent.
I have exactly the same expectation of any document or communication platform. It's been long established as accepted compomise between security and convenience.
> Is there a technical limitation that prevents chat histories from being stored locally on the user's computer
People access ChatGPT through different interfaces: Web, desktop app, their phones, tablets.
Therefore the conversations are stored on the servers. It's really not some hidden plot against users to steal their data. It's just how most users expect their apps to work.
Nonsense. It's easy to design an app where the server stores all information in an encrypted form. If OpenAI "cared about privacy" like this PR piece claims, they would do this. They don't because they (obviously) don't care and they (obviously) want the data for their purposes.
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They're very valuable data, and it's convenient to log in to see a previous chat.
If you have ever played with the api, its clear as day that the protocol itself is stateless.