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tcdent • today at 9:32 PM • 4 replies • view on HN

> ... a chatbot account associated with Alfozan’s spouse (which shared multiple identifiers and attributes with Alfozan’s own chatbot account) submitted prompts between Sept. 24 and Sept. 30 related to building, customizing, installing, audio recording, testing, obfuscating, and remote accessing a device, including inquiries about “build[ing] a continuous audio recorder,” “customiz[ing] Wi-Fi . . . connectivity,” “improv[ing] audio and live listening,” and “encrypt[ing] the SD card,” among other things. The same chatbot account also submitted prompts specifically related to Recording Device 1, including its custom header and unique MAC address, between Sept. 27 and Sept. 28.

The justice.gov article doesn't specifically say it was an OpenAI account, but I think, based on the fact that they have logs including MAC address of the device, that we could probably assume that. The alternative is that other chatbot account providers are collaborating.

Regardless, doing a string search on a MAC address for a device you find inside your property doesn't strike me as an abuse of the data that is also your property.


Replies

schiffern • today at 9:38 PM

  >submitted prompts... including its custom header and unique MAC
Sounds more like he put the exact MAC address in a prompt somewhere while setting it up.
gip • today at 9:38 PM

Not the smartest engineer ever, that use case perfectly align with using a Chinese model! And anyway I have no idea how he was hoping not to be caught in the case the device would be discovered.

clear-octopus • today at 9:36 PM

[dead]

Barrin92 • today at 9:41 PM

in addition to the whole crime thing, an 'openai engineer', apparently engineering lead according to his linkedin, having to ask chatgpt to tell him how to set up a recorder or how to encrypt a sd card is something. Truly the cream of the engineering crop at those top AI labs