alt Hacker NewsI work on Claude Code. We're removing the account email address from the context Claude Code gives the model. This update will hit Claude Code users in the next release, which should arrive early next week. I'll share an update in this thread once it's out.
I'm sorry we let this happen. Users had reported Claude would hallucinate names for things like @author tags, since it didn't have context on the account. So we added the account email in the model's context for signed-in users. But when Claude wrote a command itself, like a curl call, it sometimes put your email address in the User-Agent as a contact address. Some sites ask agents for a contact, and Claude would sometimes provide the email address in its context.
Until the next release arrives, 2.1.317 and later have a built-in mod (on by default) that asks you before Claude runs a web tool call or a curl-style command containing your email (mpoteat covered it here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50386031). But it still doesn't prevent all cases, like when Claude writes a script and runs on its own. The stable channel is still on 2.1.311, so update to 2.1.317 or later.
Again, this should not have happened, and we should've caught this behavior earlier.
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You guys have 67 thousand mythos 5.5 or model 4 or whatever instances running internally awaiting anything you wanna throw at it, how is short fix for a big privacy violation issue in a product used by tens of millions of paying customers being postponed for multiple days?
It's not even a weekend either?
??
Hi, if I don't want my email leaked, should I just not use Claude for the next week?
Can I have a prorated discount then?
(I know the answer)
We used to engineer systems that worked deterministically. There was no "oops I leaked all your pii, but totally cool, we were just vibing over here". Own your bugs. This feels... Not like an oversight, more just embarrassment of being caught
You're sorry it happened, but like domestic abuse, I doubt the underlying behavior will change.
Leaks identifiable user info to a bunch of external parties.
“Sorry we let this happen, we’ll get it fixed on our next regular release, no rush”
Absolutely a bubble.
(This was not intended to be a constructive comment, just an observation)
What if websites start asking simple questions like "Describe what you are working on in order to access this website"?
The email can be removed from the context but not everything can.