ChatGPT 'steals' search terms from other tabs, returns NULL - security issue?

ChatGPT Bugs
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I saw this problem today while I was trying out web browsing mode. Before that, I did not use ChatGPT past couple of days. So, I am logging in and shocking myself with a lot of New chat’s on the left side I did not generate (A) and ChatGPT responses like I was asking what is NULL (B).

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Literary, there were 25 chats that I did not make, and approx 90% of them was this from image above. I have checked all of them and erase them, but some were different and then I understood why - because they were my search terms in Duck Duck Go.

Except that, New chat’s were also here in web history.

Web browser: Brave
Search engine: Duck Duck Go

It was also kind of intense for the hardware too; memory and CPU usage was higher, since I’ve noticed that laptop was overheating.

I see two problems:

  1. search terms intended for different tab (and search engine) were ‘hijacked’ and used as prompt . Obviously without my knowledge.
  2. Sometimes it uses NULL, like ChatGPT 3.5 version did not find anything because it cannot search the web (?), sometimes returns the adequate response…but in any case, it is using prompts which are limited in number/time period

Has anyone seen something similar?
Can we agree it is not ‘normal’, it is not a feature?

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I installed a extension on google chrome that added chatgpt in the sidebar so i could see its output while im doing google searches. so, everytime i do a google search, the chatgpt extension over in the sidebar is relaying its usual output. it can be kinda handy when search results arent that great.
that being said, every time this happens, it puts one of those “new chat” in my openai page. Since i have to log into my openai account for the extension to work, it makes sense that it records the transaction along with the regular chatgpt instances. I assume if i were signed up for multiple extensions and applications in which i had to log into my openai account, i would have even more of those “new chat” showing up on my openai page.

i dont think anything nefarious is going on

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To be fair, it may have sense in your case. However, not a single Chat GPT related plugin was installed in my Brave browser.

This still worries me, and I will definitely make sure that I log off in ChatGPT tab every time I don’t use it.

It would be interesting to hear if there are similar cases with other users. To tell you the truth, I feel a bit disappointed since Brave browser is blocking a lot of malware and scripts, Duck Duck Go is allegedly an anonymous web search engine, and yet I feel this is somehow a data collection for which I did not give consent, or at least it is out of my control.

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I had the same problem as you and encountered it twice in Google Chrome, the first time I encountered the NULL search, it even used GPT4 instead, I’m still looking for a solution, if you find it, please share it with me, thanks

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I have the same problem. I logged in to ChatGPT and after about 2 weeks, I had more than 100 ‘Could you tell me something about null?’ questions.

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i have same problem. every new search in my chrome creates “new chat” with promt “Could you tell me something about ?”

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I also see the same issue.
Currently, logout after using chatGPT can stop this thing.

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Hi!
I also see the same issue with the new chats :frowning:

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I had the same problem and found out it was a chrome extension issue. in my case “Infinite Dashboard”.

1 Like
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This solved it for me, thank you! I was using Brave with the Infinity Dashboard extension.

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Could you please tell me how you solved this problem?

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Me personally - exactly like someone above suggested - by disabling the Infinity Dashboard extension within Brave browser.
That fixed both the “New chat” issue and the Brave is really allocating less resources now.