OpenAI Browser: What will it do with all your private data?

OpenAI's upcoming browser promises to revolutionize the web thanks to its AI. But this convenience comes with unprecedented access to your online activity. We analyze its privacy policy to reveal what data it will collect, how it will use it, and what this means for you. The truth, straight up.

The announcement of a web browser developed by OpenAI has sparked a heated debate that goes beyond competition with Google Chrome. The real underlying question isn't who will dominate the market, but rather the nature of the new data pact being proposed to users. For its built-in AI assistant, known as "Operator," to perform complex tasks like booking a trip or filling out a form, it needs full and continuous access to the user's web activity. This makes the browser one of the most powerful data collection tools ever created, necessitating a rigorous analysis of OpenAI's privacy policies and their implications.

To understand what an OpenAI browser might collect, we must first look at its current privacy policy, which applies to services like ChatGPT. The policy details extensive data collection, which can be grouped into several categories:

• Account information: Name, contact information, credentials, payment details, and transaction history.

• User Content: This is the most critical. OpenAI collects personal data that users enter into its services, including questions (prompts), uploaded files (images, audio), and any other type of content.

Technical and usage data:

• Log Data: Information that your browser automatically sends, such as your IP address, browser type, settings, and the date and time of your requests.

• Usage Data: Information about how the Services are used, what features are used, what actions are performed, time zone, country, and device type.

• Location information: The general location of the device, inferred from the IP address, is used for security purposes and to improve the product experience.

A web browser would dramatically expand the scope of "User Content" and "Usage Data" collection, encompassing every site visited, every click made, and every piece of data entered into a form.

The idea that interactions with AI are ephemeral or anonymous has been debunked. In May, a US court order forced OpenAI to retain chat logs that it routinely deleted, according to its policy. This case revealed that every conversation with ChatGPT is recorded, stored, and subject to legal review.

This sets a key precedent: interactions within the OpenAI ecosystem are not inherently private. A browser, which would record much broader and more sensitive activity than a chatbot, would operate under this same paradigm.

"Users should be cautious and strategic about the personal data they share using AI tools. These are not neutral intellectual tools, but commercial products designed to extract value from their users." – Ainvest analysis on privacy in AI.

According to its privacy policy, OpenAI uses personal data for several purposes, including:

• Provide, analyze, and maintain our services: For example, to respond to user questions.

• Improving and developing new services and conducting research: This is the most important point. The entire browsing history of millions of users would become an invaluable training dataset for perfecting existing AI models and creating new, more powerful ones.

• Sharing with third parties: The policy allows data to be shared with service providers (hosting, customer service), security partners, and, crucially, with government authorities or other third parties to comply with legal obligations.

While OpenAI claims it can aggregate or de-identify personal data, the detailed nature of browsing activity makes complete de-identification extremely difficult.

OpenAI's browser represents the ultimate expression of 21st-century digital barter: unprecedented convenience and efficiency are offered in exchange for near-total surveillance. The ability of an AI agent to act on our behalf is appealing, but it's based on the premise that AI "knows" our habits, preferences, and intentions better than anyone else.

The security and privacy implications are profound:

• Centralization of risk: A single repository containing the detailed browsing history of millions of users becomes a high-value target for cybercriminals and intelligence agencies.

• Surveillance infrastructure: As experts point out, these AI tools are, in essence, a “surveillance infrastructure” that we are voluntarily feeding with the most intimate details of our lives.

• Loss of autonomy: As AI not only assists but also acts, the line between suggestion and manipulation becomes dangerously thin.

Although OpenAI implements "commercially reasonable" security measures, it also acknowledges in its policy that "no Internet or email transmission is completely secure or error-free." Ultimately, the decision to adopt this new technology will depend on user trust, not only in the AI's capabilities, but also in the ethics and security of the company that controls it.