Elon Musk attacks Apple/ChatGPT integration as “creepy spyware.”
Elon Musk is so opposed to Apple’s plan to integrate OpenAI’s ChatGPT with device operating systems that he’s seemingly spreading misconceptions while heavily criticizing the partnership.
Apple and OpenAI currently have the most misunderstood partnership in tech
On X (formerly Twitter), Musk has been criticizing alleged privacy and security risks since the plan was announced Monday at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference.
“If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies,” Musk posted on X. “That is an unacceptable security violation.” In another post responding to Apple CEO Tim Cook, Musk wrote, “Don’t want it. Either stop this creepy spyware or all Apple devices will be banned from the premises of my companies.”
Musk also posted a meme suggesting that Apple planned to share user data with OpenAI. Another post of his temporarily received a fact-checking community note after suggesting that Apple hastily and cluelessly formed the partnership without regard for user privacy and security.
“It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security & privacy!” Musk wrote. “Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river.”
The community note, which has since been removed, added some context, contradicting Musk by clarifying that Apple has developed its own AI models and will only use ChatGPT when users “elect to.” But while that note has now disappeared (although it lives on in screenshots), X users have continued criticizing Musk’s posts as misleading or otherwise sought to clarify how the ChatGPT integration works.Advertisement
Essentially, Musk alleged that OpenAI will have device-level access to Apple user data that users may not be able to opt out of, and the ChatGPT integration will behave like spyware by allowing OpenAI to collect and share data with third parties without user consent.
However, Musk’s characterization of the partnership does not match what Apple shared at the conference. A chief technology officer at a private equity firm, Sam Pullara, posted on X that “data for a specific request is only sent to OpenAI” when the user “approves it on a per request basis,” with Apple providing “no access to the device.”
“That is no different than using the ChatGPT app today,” Pullara wrote.
Pullara’s clarification did not seem to impress Musk much.
“Then leave it as an app,” Musk replied. “This is bullshit.”
According to joint statements from OpenAI and Apple, the integration of ChatGPT allows “users to access ChatGPT’s capabilities—including image and document understanding—without needing to jump between tools.” This apparently works through API requests that Apple and OpenAI said “are not stored by OpenAI.” The integration is also solely available through opting in, meaning users can choose to use ChatGPT if they want to. Even asking Siri a question will prompt a disclosure to the user “before any questions are sent to ChatGPT,” the companies said.
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OpenAI and Apple also confirmed that “users’ IP addresses are obscured.” And any paid ChatGPT users who choose to connect their accounts to Apple devices can maintain the same data preferences and data deletion processes as when using the app—because through the integration, those “privacy protections are built in.”
Whether there are security or privacy risks similar to what Musk describes will likely be uncovered once security experts can analyze devices and weigh in. Until then, Cook has sought to reassure users that using ChatGPT or Apple’s AI models will be “completely private and secure.”
“Our unique approach combines generative AI with a user’s personal context to deliver truly helpful intelligence,” Cook said in the blog. “And it can access that information in a completely private and secure way to help users do the things that matter most to them. This is AI as only Apple can deliver it, and we can’t wait for users to experience what it can do.”
Ars could not immediately reach X or Apple for comment. OpenAI declined to comment on how Apple’s ChatGPT integration works under the hood.
Musk’s long-running beef with OpenAI
None of the available information posted on X or company blogs has seemingly persuaded Musk that ChatGPT’s integration with Apple devices will safeguard user data, though. He’s even humored one X user who suggested that X should “partner with Samsung to manufacture an X phone” to compete with Apple by responding, “it is not out of the question.”
Other users had less confidence in Musk’s abilities as an engineer because of his posts. In one X exchange, an app developer suggested that Musk was seemingly demonstrating a lack of understanding that most engineers should have.
“I can’t believe this guy calls himself an ‘engineer’ without understanding that it’s on device and opt-out,” the app developer wrote. “The most hypocritical part of this is that Tesla captures so much more data everywhere you drive.”
That post prompted a retort from another X user, alleging that Musk “knows how it works” and was intentionally “spreading misinformation.”
Of course, Musk wasn’t the only X user criticizing Apple’s partnership with OpenAI. If you scroll through Musk’s replies, you’ll find the X owner engaging with plenty of other users who agree with him that Apple is making the wrong move.
In a recent exchange, Musk responded to a user posting a funny video to liken a clowning ice cream vendor tricking a customer into accepting an empty cone to “Apple tricking you into believing your data is secure.”
“The truth is that handing your data over to digital superintelligence (that Apple themselves cannot even build or understand) at the operating system level is insane,” Musk wrote, harping on the risks, even though this doesn’t seem to be the case with the Apple/OpenAI partnership.
While Musk has previously clashed with Apple over X advertising, they seemed to largely quash that beef in 2022. Since then, Musk has seemed to focus more energy on escalating his long-running beef with OpenAI, which he helped co-found in 2015 but left in 2018. He has since accused OpenAI of chasing profits while growing increasingly less transparent about their AI tools.
Those frustrations culminated in a lawsuit in March, where Musk alleged that OpenAI compromised the original mission and “induced” him into donating $44 million by allegedly falsely promising that OpenAI would always remain a nonprofit.
OpenAI responded by calling Musk’s “extraordinary” claims “incoherent” and “a fiction,” CNN reported.
Apparently, Musk decided to drop that lawsuit today while firing off posts on X aimed at his former legal opponent. A court filing from his lawyer showed that Musk had requested the dismissal of his claims without prejudice.
