ChatGPT Can Now Access Up to Date Information
ChatGPT can now browse the internet to provide users with current information, its parent company, OpenAI, announced Wednesday....
Facts
- ChatGPT can now browse the internet to provide users with current information, its parent company, OpenAI, announced Wednesday.1
- Prior to the latest update, the knowledge base of the chatbot's artificial intelligence-powered system was limited to a data training set that ended in September 2021.2
- The new feature, called Browse with Bing, is currently only available to those with Plus and Enterprise subscriptions, but the company says it plans to roll it out to all users.3
- In May, OpenAI tested a feature that allowed premium subscribers to access up-to-date information through the Bing search engine, but the feature was deactivated two months later over concerns that users could use it to circumvent paywalls.4
- US regulators have expressed concern over the risk of ChatGPT producing false information, with the Federal Trade Commission requesting information from OpenAi on how it would manage the issue.2
- The new update comes just days after the chatbot was upgraded with new voice and image recognition tools, allowing users to converse with the chatbot — similar to virtual assistants like Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri.5
Sources: 1Reuters, 2BBC News, 3Jerusalem Post, 4Al Jazeera and 5Independent.
Narratives
- Narrative A, as provided by Business today. By giving ChatGPT the capability to access real-time information, OpenAi is giving users the ability to quickly answer their burning questions. Instead of getting vague information or having the chatbot say it doesn't know anything that happened since 2021, users can now ask questions about recent events, negating the need for them to use search engines like Google or sites like X to learn more. The world is one step closer to the realm of science fiction.
- Establishment-critical narrative, as provided by Al Jazeera. This new update brings additional concerns about the risks of AI. ChatGPT's limited dataset gave it a valuable safety net, but by opening the floodgates to current information, ChatGPT is more likely to display harmful material, misinformation, and copyrighted content to users. This new update will also require users to enable their chat history to allow the new browser plugin to work, which puts them at risk of their data being scraped and leaked.