OpenAI Plugin Lets ChatGPT Read, Send Your iMessages

OpenAI has given ChatGPT the ability to read, search, write and send messages inside Apple's iMessage — a move Bloomberg reports is likely to raise privacy questions for the iPhone maker.

The Apple Messages plugin went live Thursday, August 20. It is limited for now to ChatGPT Work and Codex users on Apple Silicon Macs.

It arrives while the two companies are in court: Apple sued OpenAI in July, accusing it of stealing trade secrets.

What the plugin does

OpenAI's announcement pitched it as a way to "search messages, catch up on conversations, draft and send replies — all with ChatGPT on your Mac."

According to Bloomberg, users can have the chatbot take actions including reading, writing and sending text messages, and can ask it to search their message history for summaries. In OpenAI's own demonstration, a user asked ChatGPT to find conversations they had missed the day before, then had the chatbot write and send the reply.

The Independent reported that the tool can also analyze a user's messages to produce insights about who they talk to and what they talk about, and that the same Mac app update improves syncing of conversations between Mac and iPhone.

The privacy question

The feature is opt-in, and deliberately hard to turn on by accident.

Bloomberg reported that users must click through several opt-in menus in both the ChatGPT app and macOS: granting ChatGPT access to the Mac's on-device Messages history, changing privacy preferences in System Settings to give the app Full Disk Access, and handing over access to contact names and automation tools.

OpenAI told Bloomberg the feature runs locally on the Mac, uses existing system tools, and does not build an index of all of a user's messages. The Independent reported that ChatGPT asks permission before sending any specific message — but that this restriction can be switched off.

Gizmodo noted that wiring a chatbot into iMessage carries the risk of prompt injection or other third-party compromise of iMessage security.