Skip to main content TechRadar the technology experts Search TechRadar View Profile België (Nederlands) Deutschland North America US (English) Australasia New Zealand Tech Radar Pro Tech Radar Gaming Amazon Prime Day Smart Home Week Nintendo Switch 2 Best web hosting NYT Wordle today Best laptop Recommended reading Artificial Intelligence ChatGPT can remember more about you than ever before – should you be worried? Artificial Intelligence I don't like the idea of my conversations with Meta AI being public – here's how you can opt out Artificial Intelligence People are tricking AI chatbots into helping commit crimes Artificial Intelligence OpenAI's high-minded approach to AI-human relationships ignores reality Artificial Intelligence ChatGPT’s memory explained: Why it doesn’t remember your past conversations Artificial Intelligence Altman says Gen Z uses ChatGPT for life decisions, here’s why that’s both smart and risky Artificial Intelligence OpenAI just upgraded memory for ChatGPT – here's everything you need to know Artificial Intelligence New judge’s ruling makes OpenAI keeping a record of all your ChatGPT chats one step closer to reality Eric Hal Schwartz 24 June 2025 When is deleted not really deleted? When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. (Image credit: Pixabay) A federal judge rejected a ChatGPT user's petition against her order that OpenAI preserve all ChatGPT chats The order followed a request by The New York Times as part of its lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft OpenAI plans to continue arguing against the ruling OpenAI will be holding onto all of your conversations with ChatGPT and possibly sharing them with a lot of lawyers, even the ones you thought you deleted. That's the upshot of an order from the federal judge overseeing a lawsuit brought against OpenAI by The New York Times over copyright infringement. Judge Ona Wang upheld her earlier order to preserve all ChatGPT conversations for evidence after rejecting a motion by ChatGPT user Aidan Hunt, one of several from ChatGPT users asking her to rescind the order over privacy and other concerns. Judge Wang told OpenAI to “indefinitely” preserve ChatGPT’s outputs since the Times pointed out that would be a way to tell if the chatbot has illegally recreated articles without paying the original publishers. But finding those examples means hanging onto every intimate, awkward, or just private communication anyone's had with the chatbot. Though what users write isn't part of the order, it's not hard to imagine working out who was conversing with ChatGPT about what personal topic based on what the AI wrote. In fact, the more personal the discussion, the easier it would probably be to identify the user. Hunt pointed out that he had no warning that this might happen until he saw a report about the order in an online forum. and is now concerned that his conversations with ChatGPT might be disseminated, including “highly sensitive personal and commercial information.” He asked the judge to vacate the order or modify it to leave out especially private content, like conversations conducted in private mode, or when there are medical or legal matters discussed. You may like ChatGPT can remember more about you than ever before – should you be worried? I don't like the idea of my conversations with Meta AI being public – here's how you can opt out People are tricking AI chatbots into helping commit crimes According to Hunt, the judge was overstepping her bounds with the order because “this case involves important, novel constitutional questions about the privacy rights incident to artificial intelligence usage – a rapidly developing area of law – and the ability of a magistrate [judge] to institute a nationwide mass surveillance program by means of a discovery order in a civil case.” Judge Wang rejected his request because they aren't related to the copyright issue at hand. She emphasized that it's about preservation, not disclosure, and that it's hardly unique or uncommon for the courts to tell a private company to hold onto certain records for litigation. That’s technically correct, but, understandably, an everyday person using ChatGPT might not feel that way. She also seemed to particularly dislike the mass surveillance accusation, quoting that section of Hunt's petition and slamming it with the legal language equivalent of a diss track. Judge Wang added a "[sic]" to the quote from Hunt's filing and a footnote pointing out that the petition "does not explain how a court’s document retention order that directs the preservation, segregation, and retention of certain privately held data by a private company for the limited purposes of litigation is, or could be, a “nationwide mass surveillance program.” It is not. The judiciary is not a law enforcement agency." That 'sic burn' aside, there's still a chance the order will be rescinded or modified after OpenAI goes to court this week to push back against it as part of the larger paperwork battle around the lawsuit. Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brandsReceive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsorsBy submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. Deleted but not gone Hunt's other concern is that, regardless of how this case goes, OpenAI will now have the ability to retain chats that users believed were deleted and could use them in the future. There are concerns over whether OpenAI will lean into protecting user privacy over legal expedience. OpenAI has so far argued in favor of that privacy and has asked the court for oral arguments to challenge the retention order that will take place this week. The company has said it wants to push back hard on behalf of its users. But in the meantime, your chat logs are in limbo. Many may have felt that writing into ChatGPT is like talking to a friend who can keep a secret. Perhaps more will now understand that it still acts like a computer program, and the equivalent of your browser history and Google search terms are still in there. At the very least, hopefully, there will be more transparency. Even if it's the courts demanding that AI companies retain sensitive data, users should be notified by the companies. We shouldn't discover it by chance on a web forum. And if OpenAI really wants to protect its users, it could start offering more granular controls: clear toggles for anonymous mode, stronger deletion guarantees, and alerts when conversations are being preserved for legal reasons. Until then, it might be wise to treat ChatGPT a bit less like a therapist and a bit more like a coworker who might be wearing a wire. You might also like Make ChatGPT remember who you are by doing these 5 simple things ChatGPT crosses a new AI threshold by beating the Turing test Sam Altman says AI chats should be as private as ‘talking to a lawyer or a doctor’, but OpenAI could soon be forced to keep your ChatGPT conversations forever See more Computing News Eric Hal Schwartz Social Links Navigation Contributor Eric Hal Schwartz is a freelance writer for TechRadar with more than 15 years of experience covering the intersection of the world and technology. For the last five years, he served as head writer for Voicebot.ai and was on the leading edge of reporting on generative AI and large language models. He's since become an expert on the products of generative AI models, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude, Google Gemini, and every other synthetic media tool. His experience runs the gamut of media, including print, digital, broadcast, and live events. Now, he's continuing to tell the stories people want and need to hear about the rapidly evolving AI space and its impact on their lives. Eric is based in New York City. You must confirm your public display name before commenting Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. ChatGPT can remember more about you than ever before – should you be worried? I don't like the idea of my conversations with Meta AI being public – here's how you can opt out People are tricking AI chatbots into helping commit crimes OpenAI's high-minded approach to AI-human relationships ignores reality ChatGPT’s memory explained: Why it doesn’t remember your past conversations Altman says Gen Z uses ChatGPT for life decisions, here’s why that’s both smart and risky Latest in Artificial Intelligence Can an AI travel agent remove the stress of vacation booking? 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