What Never to Paste into a Chatbot

Do not paste account numbers, passwords, medical details, children’s information, or someone else’s private messages.

A chatbot is a text box that sends what you type to a company. Treat it like a postcard. If you would not pin it on a noticeboard, do not paste it.

Keep out

Account numbers, passwords, medical papers, children's details, someone else's messages.

Say instead

The shape of the problem. 'A direct debit did not leave. Do not invent an account number.'

Postcard test

The AI course includes an email to a bank. That exercise tells you to leave the account number out. This page is the full list.

Never paste these

• Bank account numbers, card numbers, OTPs, and passwords.
• National ID numbers, passport numbers, and driver’s permit numbers.
• Medical details, prescriptions, lab results, and photos of those papers.
• A child’s name together with a school, a grade, a photo, or an address.
• Someone else’s private message, salary, or client list.
• A full spreadsheet of customers.

You can still get help. Describe the shape of the problem. “A direct debit did not leave my account this month. Write a short, firm email. Do not invent an account number.” That is enough.

Photos count

A picture of a bill is the bill. A screenshot of a chat is the chat. Uploads on free plans are limited, and they are still an upload. Crop out names and numbers before you even consider it, and prefer not to upload it at all.

Work is not an exception

A nurse’s note, a teacher’s mark book, and a tradesperson’s customer phone list are other people’s data. Draft a blank form. Put the real details in yourself, on paper or in the system your workplace already uses. The nurse, teacher, and trades essays walk through that line.

If you already pasted it

Change the password if a password was included. Call the bank if a card or account number was included. Tell your workplace if client or patient information was included. Deleting the chat on your screen does not promise the text is gone from the service. Do not paste it again “to ask how to delete it”.

Then learn the check in how to check an AI answer. Keeping secrets in, and keeping inventions out, are the two habits.

Discussion

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