Welcome to the forefront of conversational AI as we explore the fascinating world of AI chatbots in our dedicated blog series. Discover the latest advancements, applications, and strategies that propel the evolution of chatbot technology. From enhancing customer interactions to streamlining business processes, these articles delve into the innovative ways artificial intelligence is shaping the landscape of automated conversational agents. Whether you’re a business owner, developer, or simply intrigued by the future of interactive technology, join us on this journey to unravel the transformative power and endless possibilities of AI chatbots.
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I’m starting to feel like a broken record, but I feel you should know that yet another AI has been found sharing private conversations so that Google was able to index them, and now they can be found in search results.
It’s déjà vu in the world of AI: another day, another exposé about chatbot conversations being leaked, indexed, or made public. We have written about the share option in ChatGPT that was swiftly removed because users seemed oblivious to the consequences, and about Meta AI first making conversations discoverable via search engines and later exposing them due to a bug. In another leak we looked at an AI bot used by McDonalds to process job applications. And, not to forget, the AI girlfriend fiasco where a hacker was able to steal a massive database of users’ interactions with their sexual partner chatbots.
In some of these cases the developers thought it was clear to the users that by using a “Share” option, their conversations were publicly accessible, but in reality, the users were just as surprised as the people that found their conversations.
This same thing must have happened at Grok, the AI chatbot developed by xAI and launched in November 2023 by Elon Musk. When Grok users press a button to share a transcript of their conversation, this also made those conversations searchable, and, according to Forbes, this was sometimes done without users’ knowledge or permission.
For example, when a Grok user wants to share their conversation with another person, they can use the “Share” button to create a unique URL which they can then send to that person. But without many users being aware, pressing that “Share” button also made the conversation available to search engines, like Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo. And that made them available for anyone to find.
Even though the account details may be hidden in the shared chatbot transcripts, the prompts—the instructions written by the user–may still contain personal or sensitive information about someone.
Forbes reported that it was able to view “conversations where users asked intimate questions about medicine and psychology.” And in one example seen by the BBC, the chatbot provided detailed instructions on how to make a Class A drug in a lab.
I have said this before, and I’ll probably have to say it again until privacy is baked deeply into the DNA of AI tools, rather than patched on as an afterthought: We have to be careful about what we share with chatbots.
While we continue to argue that the developments in AI are going too fast for security and privacy to be baked into the tech, there are some things to keep in mind to make sure your private information remains safe:
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August 21, 2025 – Apple has released security updates to patch a zero-day vulnerability tracked as CVE-2025-43300 for all platforms
August 21, 2025 – Google has settled a lawsuit against YouTube for $30 million but did not admit collecting the data of minors for targeted advertising.
August 19, 2025 – Startups are ready to bring AI powered toys to the market as an alternative for screen time. But is that really progress?
August 18, 2025 – Meta has introduced Instagram Map. How can you control what others can see about your location? An explainer.
August 18, 2025 – A list of topics we covered in the week of August 11 to August 17 of 2025
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pieter Arntz
Was a Microsoft MVP in consumer security for 12 years running. Can speak four languages. Smells of rich mahogany and leather-bound books.
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