OpenAI Challenges Court Order to Hand Over 20M ChatGPT Conversations
AI firm warns of privacy breach as it resists demand to share anonymised chat logs in copyright case filed by The New York Times and other publishers.
Staff WriterNov 13, 2025, 2:09 PMOpenAI has asked a federal judge in New York to overturn an order requiring it to hand over 20 million anonymised ChatGPT chat logs amid a copyright lawsuit filed by The New York Times and several other news outlets. The company argued that complying with the order would risk exposing users’ private conversations.
The artificial intelligence firm said that “99.99 per cent” of the chat transcripts have no connection to the copyright infringement claims in the case. “To be clear: anyone in the world who has used ChatGPT in the past three years must now face the possibility that their personal conversations will be handed over to The Times to sift through in a speculative fishing expedition,” OpenAI stated in its filing.
The publishers said the logs are essential to determine whether ChatGPT reproduced their copyrighted material and to challenge OpenAI’s claim that they had “hacked” the chatbot’s responses to fabricate evidence. The lawsuit accuses OpenAI of using their articles to train ChatGPT without permission.
Magistrate Judge Ona Wang, who ordered the production of the chat logs, said users’ privacy would be protected through “exhaustive de-identification” and other safeguards. OpenAI has until Friday to submit the transcripts.
In a blog post, OpenAI Chief Information Security Officer Dane Stuckey said the order would compel the company to “turn over tens of millions of highly personal conversations from people who have no connection to the Times’ baseless lawsuit,” calling it a violation of privacy and security principles.
A New York Times spokesperson dismissed OpenAI’s statement, saying it “purposely misleads its users and omits the facts.” The spokesperson added, “No ChatGPT user’s privacy is at risk. The court ordered OpenAI to provide a sample of chats, anonymised by OpenAI itself, under a legal protective order.”
The case is one of several ongoing lawsuits against technology firms accused of using copyrighted material to train artificial intelligence systems.
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