Who can see a chat I've shared?
Thousands of shared chats ended up on Google.
In July 2025, Fast Company searched Google and found more than 4,500 shared ChatGPT conversations in the results.
Many were personal. Some included people's names and where they lived, because they'd mentioned them in the chat.
When you made a share link, there was an option to make the chat visible in web searches. People ticked it, probably without thinking much about what it meant.
OpenAI's response: "Shared chats are only visible in Google search if users explicitly select this option."
Which was true. It was also a box that a lot of people didn't really read.
Public link: a web address that works for anyone who has it, with no login needed.
Most share links are public links. Anyone who gets hold of the address can read the chat. Links get forwarded, pasted into Slack, dropped into emails and copied into documents.
Once it's out, you can't take back the copies people have already made.
A share link usually includes everything in the chat up to that point, not only the answer you were proud of.
Scroll back up and look. Did you paste a client's email? Mention a colleague by name? Upload a spreadsheet? Talk about something personal before getting to the work part?
If there's a link anyone can open, treat it like posting on a noticeboard.
Read the whole chat before you share it. All of it, not only the last answer.
Copy and paste the answer instead, if that's all the other person needs.
Never tick "discoverable" or "visible in search" for anything work-related.
Clean up old links. Most apps have a list of your shared links in settings. Delete the ones you don't need.