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Palisades Fire suspect's ChatGPT history to be used as evidence
- Baader-Meinhof 1y agohttp://archive.today/K030p http://archive.today/K030p
- gundmc 1y agoNot surprising. Search and browsing history has been used as evidence for some time.
- preciousoo 1y agoComing into the thread(and general discussion about chatgpt being used as evidence) with this context, I’m confused about the reactions to this. Online activity has been used as evidence as far as I remember. OpenAI also has a couple high profile cases against them with chatgpt history used as the primary evidence
- NotPractical 1y agoNearly anything that isn't end-to-end encrypted is fair game, assuming there is probable cause. Access to your physical location history (even if you weren't suspected of a crime) wasn't off limits until 2024 [1]. (It still isn't off limits if you are suspected of a crime, but is no longer collected at the scale of "most Android users" [2].) [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/08/federal-appeals-court-finds-geofence-warrants-are-categorically-unconstitutional https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/08/federal-appeals-court-... [2] https://techcrunch.com/2023/12/16/google-geofence-warrants-law-enforcement-privacy/ https://techcrunch.com/2023/12/16/google-geofence-warrants-l...
- kube-system 1y agoEnd-to-end encrypted data is also fair game -- the only difference is that there are simply fewer parties that have the data to give.
- vintermann 1y agoChats with chatgpt are end to end encrypted (it's https), but one of the ends is OpenAI.
- Sophira 1y agoWhile I understand (and agree with) the general sentiment of what you're saying, you are not correct in saying that this is end-to-end encryption, and HTTPS itself does not guarantee that end-to-end encryption is in use. In this case, there's an explicit middle point - chatgpt.com resolves to a CloudFlare server, so CloudFlare is actually one of the ends here. It likely acts as a reverse proxy, meaning that it will forward your requests to a different, OpenAI-owned server. This might be over a new HTTPS connection, or it might be over an unencrypted HTTP connection. It really is super important to emphasize this point. End-to-end encryption is not simply that your data is encrypted between you and the ultimate endpoint. It's that it can't be decrypted along the way - and decrypting your HTTPS requests is something that CloudFlare needs to do in order to work. (To be clear, I'm not accusing CloudFlare of anything shady here. I'm just saying that people have forgotten what end-to-end encryption really means.)
- ProofHouse 1y agoGreat points, of course if you use full strict or flexible SSL you could be ok (safe) from Cloudflare, but no way that is the case here
- Sophira 1y agoI don't believe there's any mode you can use that would make it truly end-to-end encryption. I may be incorrect, but I don't recall seeing anything like that.
- addaon 1y agoYep. This is why the estimates of compute needed for AI (if it turns out to be useful) are many orders of magnitude too low — the technology isn’t mature until it actually succeeds at tasks, with fully homomorphic encryption from my prompt through the response.
- godshatter 1y agoIt still boggles my mind that in this day and age most people use the one search engine that keeps the most copious records of everything that is entered and that ties that to the most information any corporation probably has about any random person. I wouldn't be surprised if everyone moved to using the NSA search engine if they ever came out with one. Just for general peace of mind, use a privacy-oriented search engine. I use leta.mullvad.net or search.brave.com usually. I haven't used Google in years. And if you just happen to have a curiosity about something fringe that might be misinterpreted in the wrong circumstances, download an LLM and use it locally.
- dncornholio 1y agoNot using Google but instead use a Mullvad or Brave search engine isn't solving any problem. Because if you cannot trust company A, you also shouldn't trust company B. If you want real and total anonymous search, use a public computer.
- system2 1y agoChatGPT and Google are different types of engines. I wonder if they will make ChatGPT submit flagged questions to authorities automatically. Since the questions are more like conversations with clear intentions, they can get very clear signals.
- gpm 1y ago> they can get very clear signals. No they can't. People write fiction, a lot of it. I'm willing to bet that the number of fiction related "incriminating" questions to chatgpt greatly numbers the number of "I'm actually a criminal" questions. Also wonder about hypotheticals, make dumb bets, etc.
- themafia 1y agoYou don't even need to make bets. Encoded within the answer of "what is the best way to prevent fires" is the obvious data on the best way to start them.
- astrange 1y agoTo be clear there is exactly nothing you're required to submit to the government as a US service provider, if that's what you mean by authorities. If you see CSAM posted on the service then you're required to report it to NCMEC, which is intentionally designed as a private entity so that it has 4th amendment protections. But you're not required to proactively go looking for even that.
- pols45 1y agoThey can do whatever they want. It's a dead end. End of the day, a chimp with a 3 inch brain has to digest the info tsunami of flagged content. That's why even the Israelis didn't see Oct 7th coming. Once upon a time I worked on a project for banks to flag complaints about Fraud in customer calls. Guess what happened? The system registered a zillion calls where people talked about fraud world wide, the manager in charge was assigned 20 people to deal with it, and after naturally getting overwhelmed and scapegoated for all kinds of shit, he puts in a request for few hundred more, saying he really needed thousands of people. Corporate wonderland gives him another 20 and writes a para in their annual report about how they are at the forefront of combatting fraud etc etc. This is how the world works. The chimp troupe hallucinates across the board, at the top and at the bottom about what is really going on. Why? Because that 3 inch chimp brain has hard limits to how much info, complexity and unpredictability it can handle. Anything beyond that, the reaction is similar to ants running around pretending they are doing something useful anytime the universe pokes the ant hill. Herbert Simon won a nobel prize for telling us we don't have to run around like ants and bite everything anytime we are faced with things we can't control.
- jampa 1y agoThe headline and article try to bias and frame the story to make people question: "Is OpenAI snitching on me?" In reality, Uber records and conflicting statements incriminated him. He seems to be the one who provided the ChatGPT record to try to prove that the fire was unintentional.[1] > He was visibly anxious during that interview, according to the complaint. His efforts to call 911 and his question to ChatGPT about a cigarette lighting a fire indicated that he wanted to create a more innocent explanation for the fire's start and to show he tried to assist with suppression, the complaint said. [1] https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-palisades-los-angeles-deb1c78c1d83d233cf3b540644814ea2 https://apnews.com/article/california-wildfires-palisades-lo...
- mtillman 1y agoOpenAI also literally announced that they send data to law enforcement after a judge told them they had to do so.
- swyx 1y agothey HAD to? didnt Apple refuse to do this exact thing?
- rogerrogerr 1y agoApple refused to create new software to allow the FBI to brute force an encrypted device. OpenAI just had this info floating around on hard drives.
- protocolture 1y agoAnd then 3 or 4 allies of the US passed laws enabling the government to require companies to develop tools or face prison time. So they probably have developed the tool, and once developed been secretly compelled to use it.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago
- AIrtemis 1y agopretty interesting that cloud data is not covered by the 4th amendment. I wonder if we’ll push for on-prem storage of context and memories as our relationship with AI gets more personal and intertwined.
- rpdillon 1y agoThird-party doctrine pretty much excludes anything in the cloud from the 4th amendment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine
- coliveira 1y agoI don't have a personal relationship with AI, and strongly suggest that people stay away from AI for personal matters.
- typpilol 1y agoI still haven't once talked to an LLM for personal reasons. It's always been to get information. Talking to an LLM like a human is like talking to a mirror. You're just shaping their responses based on what you say. Quite sad to see stuff like the "myboyfriendisai" reddit
- fl0id 1y agoSo perfect if ppl want their partner to be molded a certain way
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- eurleif 1y agoThe article states that OpenAI only discloses user content with a search warrant. How did that lead you to believe that it's not subject to the fourth amendment?
- loeg 1y agoHasn't happened yet. Why would it change now?
- renewiltord 1y agoI sure hope that cats in military uniforms don't invade NYC because they're going to find the evidence on my ChatGPT account.
- gpm 1y agoAre we talking house cats here, or full grown lions, or gozilla-cats? Godzilla cats really seems like it needs a movie.
- hannasanarion 1y agoThis title is misleading. The article doesn't say that the chat history will be used as evidence, only that it exists. Whether it can be used in court is an unsettled question, as explained in the last few paragraphs.
- nightpool 1y agoHow is it unsettled? If they got a warrant for it, what would prevent them from using it as evidence?
- beefnugs 1y agoAnother thread says they tried to use his past "drawing a fire related photo" to try and paint him as some kind of pyromaniac. These clods just cant help themselves but to prove AT THE FIRST CHANCE that they will twist and abuse anything they can get their hands on to paint some kind of picture. Its hilarious that they cant even keep this in their back pockets to wait for a real real bad hard to persecute criminal to use it on either
- exe34 1y agoit's like not speaking to the police - but it's everything you have ever said/asked for in your life outside of talking to yourself in the shower. or at least it's getting there. a lot of people, especially younger ones, seem to use chatgpt as a neutral third party in every important decision. so it probably has more extensive records on their thoughts than social media ever did. in fact, people often curate their Instagram feeds - but chatgpt has their unfiltered thoughts.
- sidewndr46 1y agoJudges can refuse to admit anything they want, or give jurors instructions of any kind about how to consider evidence in relation to a crime. About the only thing a judge can't do is fabricate evidence themselves.
- rafram 1y ago> But more curious than the allegation that a Florida man was responsible for setting a small brush fire on the other side of the country As far as I’ve heard from other articles, he lived in the Palisades at the time and worked as an Uber driver there. He moved to Florida after the fire. This is not very well researched.
- smt88 1y agoRolling Stone has not been a serious publication for quite some time
- whatsupdog 1y ago[flagged]
- hshdhdhehd 1y agoClimate change "I'll provide the tinder you provide the spark!"
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- dylan604 1y ago"This felony charge, he added, carried a mandatory minimum prison sentence of five years in federal prison but is punishable by up to 20 years in prison." Are the 12 deaths separate charges? A sentence of 5-20 years seems very light for 12 deaths. This article is clearly focused on the AI aspect of it, so it doesn't cover the charges at all really.
- dawatchusay 1y agoPlease correct me if I’m wrong but it’s my understanding he didn’t start the fire that burned much of the Palisades; he started a fire that was put out (or at least was claimed to be so) which rekindled later and the rest is history.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- parineum 1y agoDid he start the fire knowing it could kill people? Did his actions lead to the death of people? That seems clear cut first degree murder to me, as I understand it (I'm not sure if it requires a specific person to be murdered but a pre-meditated act that kills people seems like it'd qualify to me).
- bilekas 1y ago> Did he start the fire knowing it could kill people? Did his actions lead to the death of people? I think those things are to be decided in court. As for the charges and times, it's mentioned only the ranges for arson but there's nothing to stop them bringing charges of manslaughter for example. They'll build evidence and charge as such. It's the process.
- mschuster91 1y ago> Did he start the fire knowing it could kill people? Leaving aside the fact that we don't know yet if he actually started the fire: anyone who starts any fire without appropriate control measures (like extinguishers or containing the fire in something made to contain it) can theoretically be charged under the law for negligence - and practically will, if things go south. And in a time where there's ample fuel for fires on the ground and the weather conditions are favorable to large fires (e.g. hot, low humidity, clear skies and strong winds) any kind of fire (even smoking - cigarette butts thrown out of car windows are a particularly bad fire source in Croatia) can quickly escalate into a full blown forest fire. Even things that one would not even perceive to be dangerous can cause fires... an all too common occurrence is a diesel car with a freshly regenerated DPF that's being parked on a parking lot that used to be overgrown with weed that's now dried out. The heat from the DPF is massive enough (> 500 °C) to lead to ignition of dried-out weeds (~ 300 °C). So, it's not a stretch to assume that anyone starting an open fire should know it might escalate into a deadly disaster. And even the reckless cases that I mentioned (smokers, car drivers) can be charged as manslaughter here in Europe.
- thaumasiotes 1y agoHmmm. I have a "saved" history in Google Gemini. The reason I put "saved" in scare quotes is that Google feels free to change the parts of that history that were supplied by Gemini. They no longer match my external records of what was said. Does ChatGPT do the same thing? I'd be queasy about relying on this as evidence.
- x______________ 1y agoCould you post some details about this or make a write-up? I'd be interested in reading more about this.
- thaumasiotes 1y agoI'm not sure what details would add. What happened: 1. I engaged with Gemini. 2. I found the results wanting, and pasted them into comment threads elsewhere on the internet, observing that they tended to support the common criticism of LLMs as being "meaning-blind". 3. Later, I went back and viewed the "history" of my "saved" session. 4. My prompts were not changed, but the responses from Gemini were different. Because of the comment threads, it was easy for me to verify that I was remembering the original exchange correctly and Google was indulging in some revision of history.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- kshacker 1y agoNot trying to excuse google but wonder why that happens. I have had my own issues with ChatGPT memory but that's more like it forgets the context and spits out something gibberish at a later invocation counter to what it said earlier in the thread. But that's because it is buggy. Rewriting history requires computes which is more malicious. Why would someone burn compute to rewrite your stuff given that rewrites are not free? Once again not defending google trying to think through what's going on.
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- mmaunder 1y agoCan't wait for the "Did ChatGPT Burn Down Palisades?" headline.
- arresin 1y ago“He’s called the AOL killer and he’s using something called ‘chatrooms’ to lure people in. Tonight, the dark side of cyberspace.”
- marcosvm 1y ago[flagged]
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- flanked-evergl 1y ago[flagged]
- miroljub 1y ago[flagged]
- tristan957 1y agoClimate change can create factors that make wildfires much larger or more dangerous. I'm dubious of your claim that climate change was cited as a cause in any serious publication. Can you provide any sources? Every fire has an ignition, and climate change is not an ignition like a lit cigarette or a lightning strike. It merely creates conditions.
- miroljub 1y ago> I'm dubious of your claim that climate change was cited as a cause in any serious publication. Can you provide any sources? I didn't claim anything about publications. I complain about the media coverage. If you want the source, you can go to YouTube and watch German Tageschau, a central news outlet. Every report of fire was followed by brainwashing about climate change. It was similar in most of the major Western European news coverage.
- tristan957 1y agoI'm not going to watch random German videos to confirm your statement for you. Please share a timestamp in a particular video. How was there any brainwashing? What are your thoughts on climate change?
- miroljub 1y ago> I'm not going to watch random German videos to confirm your statement for you. Please share a timestamp in a particular video. Then don't. I don't need your confirmation. If you are interested, it's easy to find. If not, why would I waste time providing you timestamped links for something you won't watch, won't understand, and would dismiss? > How was there any brainwashing? Watch and see :) > What are your thoughts on climate change? Everything changes, including climate. My thoughts about it are not relevant to the topic of mainstream media reporting and brainwashing.
- dvfjsdhgfv 1y agoI don't get these people. I get nervous to type even something like "why in movies people throw up after killing someone" in Google, even in incognito mode. Why would anyone put something even remotely incriminating into the hands of another company?
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- phendrenad2 1y agoIf anyone's wonder if this guy was really the cause of the Palisade's fire: No, probably not. His reportedly erratic and eccentric behavior tells me he's probably not mentally capable of standing trial. Normally the government would just shrug, call it an act of nature, and move on. But for some reason they're going out of their way to pin this fire on someone.
- ghtbircshotbe 1y agoI don't know how they would establish causality (for the major fire and deaths) beyond a reasonable doubt when the fire he set was seemingly put out and the entire region is a tinderbox. Whatever his crimes, he seems like a convenient scapegoat for larger systemic failures.
- phendrenad2 1y agoIf I can tin-foil-hat a bit, wouldn't it make sense if ruling the fire an act of arson would be favorable to someone with power, such as the Malibu landowners or the insurance companies? If anyone wants to "cui bono" their way to an article about it I'd be interesting in reading that.
- deezmofonutz 1y ago[flagged]
- echelon_musk 1y agoI was gearing up to smugly quote the HN guidelines to you but I find myself surprised to see that there is no clear messaging against supporting acts of violence. Allow me to violate the guidelines and note how this is in stark contrast to Reddit. For better or worse.
- AlexeyBelov 1y agoHN has issues with trolls, and trolls don't care about guidelines. Almost every time I read a comment that's clearly out of place it comes from a throwaway-like account registered like 4 months ago. And the comment history is full of such comments, so it's often not a one-off. Despite this, HN doesn't do much about it, and creating new accounts and trolling for a couple of months is very, very easy.
- labrador 1y ago"Sam Altman warns there’s no legal confidentiality when using ChatGPT as a therapist" https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/25/sam-altman-warns-theres-no-legal-confidentiality-when-using-chatgpt-as-a-therapist/ https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/25/sam-altman-warns-theres-no...
- datahiker101 1y agoRemember folks, your AI chats are like text messages, they're not private diaries.
- nusl 1y agoStrange. The article says that he made the fire, called first responders, who put the fire out. The fire continued to smolder before reigniting in later winds. If you cause a problem, report it, then the authorities responsible for dealing with those problems take care of it and go home, what does it mean? Are the authorities then partially responsible for not ensuring the fire was put out properly before leaving the area? Is he even guilty at all given that he filled his duty and reported the problem after unintentionally causing it?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- criley2 1y ago[flagged]
- nashashmi 1y agoThe question to ask is manslaughter or first degree murder.
- jvanderbot 1y agoIntent here will matter. If he's got a gun fetish and accidentally set it off, killing someone, that's different than shooting it at someone. He might have had a fire fetish, set one, extinguished it, and despite his intent it got out of control. Hard to say though. Either way, I can see a stiff penalty to prevent future use of the "oops I just like fire" defense.
- wat10000 1y agoThat matters in terms of what sort of punishment you're looking at, but I don't think it matters as far as whether the hospital's failures absolve you. If you accidentally shoot somebody and then the hospital screws up and they die, should you be on the hook for manslaughter, or just negligent injury or whatever it would be called? I'd argue it should be the former. Death is a foreseeable consequence of your negligence even if it wasn't inevitable in this particular case. This seems similar to the eggshell skull rule. Wikipedia describes a case where a person was successfully prosecuted for murder after stabbing someone who then refused a blood transfusion and died as a result.
- rank0 1y agoI would like to know if OpenAI is able to supply this information to law enforcement even if their user's history has been cleared.
- maples37 1y agoIs there any reason to believe that deleting a ChatGPT conversation is anything more than "UPDATE conversations SET status='user_deleted WHERE conversation_id=..."?
- rank0 1y agoDon’t get me wrong, I am highly skeptical. I also am genuinely curious because it seems to be in their best interest to delete these records for a few reasons: 1. Adherence to their own customer-facing policy. 2. Corporate or government customers would CERTAINLY want their data handling requirements to be respected. 3. In my experience at $MEGA_CORP, we absolutely delete customer data or never maintain logs at all for ML inference products. 4. They’re a corporation with explicit goal of making money. They’re not interested in assisting LE beyond minimum legal requirements. But still I wonder what the reality is at OpenAI.
- heavyset_go 1y ago> They’re a corporation with explicit goal of making money. They’re not interested in assisting LE beyond minimum legal requirements. Having a good relation with LE and the state is beneficial to companies, it puts them in a good position to sell them services, get preferential treatment, quid pro quo, etc. Look at how Google, Microsoft, Amazon etc cozied up to LE and the government. They get billion dollar contracts, partnerships with LE and the more they cooperate willingly, the less likely they'll be sued into cooperation or punished with loss of contracts.
- exabrial 1y agoAll I can say is GOOD. If a person is suspected of committing a crime, and police obtain a specific, pointed, warrant for information pertaining to an individual, tech companies have a moral obligation to comply, in the best interests of humanity. If law enforcement or spy agency asked for a dragnet warrant like "find me all of the people that might be guilty of XYZ" or "find me something this individual might be guilty of"; tech companies have a moral obligation to resist, in the best interest of humanity. The first is an example of the justice system working correctly in a free society; the second is an example of totalitarian government seeking to frame individuals.
- jonny_eh 1y ago> the Justice Department’s allegations against Rinderknecht are supported by evidence found on his phone Sounds like they got the info from his phone, not taken from any servers, so this is likely not an example of a tech company "complying".
- bitpush 1y agoHow do you square this with Apple's pushback few years back against FBI who asked for a specific individual's details. I'm not taking sides, but it sounds like if ChatGPT cooperating with LE is a Good Thing (TM), then Apple making a public spectacle of how they are not going to cooperate is .. bad? I'm fully aware that Apple might not even be able to provide them the information, which is a separate conversation.
- closetohome 1y agoThe difference is that in this case OpenAI was able to produce the requested information without compromising security for their other customers.
- SilasX 1y agoRight, for the OpenAI case to be analogous, they would have to switch to a system where your chats are homomorphically encrypted -- i.e. OpenAI does all its operations without knowing either the input or output plaintext. In that case, they'd only have encrypted chats to begin with, and would have to somehow get your key to comply with a warrant for the plaintext. And note: the above scenario is not likely anywhere in the near future, because homomorphic encryption has something like a million times overhead, and requires you to hit the entire database on every request, when state-of-the-art LLM systems are already pushing the limits of computation.
- scotty79 1y agoLocal LLM chat control when?
- gosub100 1y agostop blaming fires on people who start them. its inevitable that someone is going to be the root cause. meanwhile the people whose job it is to manage the forest or wilderness areas are scot-free. At least send them to prison too.