ChatGPT's much-heralded Mac app was storing conversations as plain text

OpenAI's Mac app for ChatGPT had a significant security issue where user conversations were stored in plain text, making them vulnerable to access by bad actors, malware, or other running apps without permission6. This occurred due to the app not being sandboxed and storing conversations in a non-protected location. OpenAI has since updated the app to encrypt local chats, but they are still not sandboxed.

User chats in OpenAI's Mac app were stored in plain text in a non-protected location, making them accessible to any other running app, process, or malware without requiring any permission prompt. This security issue has now been addressed by OpenAI through an update that encrypts the local chats.