US House bans members from using all chatbots except ChatGPT Plus

The United States House of Representatives recently adopted new rules banning all use of artificial intelligence (AI) large language models by members, with the sole exception of OpenAI’s ChatGPT Plus service. 

According to a notice sent from the U.S. House’s chief administrative officer, Catherine Szpindor, chatbot use has been restricted for security purposes:

“House offices using the ChatGPT artificial intelligence chatbot are only authorized to use the ChatGPT Plus version of the product. The Plus version of the product incorporates important privacy features that are necessary to protect House data.”

The memo added that “no other versions of ChatGPT or other large language models Al software are authorized for use in the House currently.”

The document also lays out provisions that limit House members’ usage of the software to “research and evaluation only” and prevents them from implementing ChatGPT into their “regular workflow.”

Other limits include restrictions from sharing any sensitive data as prompts and a requirement that ChatGPT Plus is used with all privacy settings enabled.

It’s unclear exactly what privacy features the document refers to, as OpenAI hasn’t listed any privacy-related benefits exclusive to the Plus service.

Per OpenAI, the ChatGPT Plus service provides general access to the model during peak times, faster query responses and priority access to new features. There’s no mention of additional privacy features.

ChatGPT users can now turn off chat history, allowing you to choose which conversations can be used to train our models: https://t.co/0Qi5xV7tLi

— OpenAI (@OpenAI) April 25, 2023

The company added the option for users of both ChatGPT and ChatGPT Plus to delete their chat history and accounts back in April, but information removed this way still remains on the ChatGPT servers for an additional 30 days.

Per an April blog post, OpenAI plans to launch a ChatGPT business subscription service with additional data control features. There’s no word yet on how this service might differ from ChatGPT Plus.

The new House rules, once adopted, will only apply directly to House members, but U.S. Reps. Ted Lieu, Ken Buck and Anna Eshoo recently introduced a bipartisan bill that would establish a federal artificial intelligence commission with a mandate to provide regulatory oversight to the U.S. AI industry at large.