What Should Never Go Into an AI Tool?
AI tools are incredible assistants, but they are not private diaries or secure filing cabinets. The golden rule is simple: if you would not post a piece of information on a public bulletin board, you should not type it into an everyday AI chat tool. Protecting your privacy starts with knowing what to keep to yourself.
Explain it simply
When you type a question or paste a document into a standard AI chatbot, that information leaves your computer. It travels to the company that built the tool. In many cases, those companies use the conversations people have with their chatbots to train their future models.
This means your private information could become part of the system's underlying pattern recognition. While companies try to filter out personal data, mistakes happen. The safest approach is to treat the chat box like a conversation in a crowded coffee shop. You can talk about general ideas, brainstorm, or ask for advice, but you should never share secrets, passwords, or sensitive details about yourself or other people. You are always in charge of what you share.
What this means for you
You do not need to be a cybersecurity expert to use AI safely. You just need to build a simple habit: pause before you paste. Ask yourself if the information you are about to share is public, general, or sensitive. If it is sensitive, remove those details before asking the AI for help. You can always add the private names, numbers, and facts back into the document after the AI has given you a useful draft. You are the final editor, and you control your data.
Try it safely
Let's practice the pause-and-edit habit. Take a piece of paper and write down a fictional scenario where you need to complain about a late delivery. Include a fake name, a fake order number, and a fake home address. Now, practice "scrubbing" that information. Rewrite the request so it is safe for an AI tool. For example, change "Write a complaint for John Smith at 123 Main St about order #998877" to "Write a professional complaint letter about a late delivery, leaving blank spaces for my name, address, and order number." This small exercise builds the exact muscle you need to stay safe.
Watch out for
Watch out for the temptation of convenience. When you are tired or in a hurry, it is tempting to just paste an entire email chain or a full document into an AI tool and ask it to "summarize this." If that email chain contains private contact information, confidential work details, or personal family drama, you have just handed that data over to the AI company. Always take the extra thirty seconds to read through what you are pasting and delete the sensitive parts. Convenience should never cost you your privacy.
Remember this
Treat an AI chat box like a conversation in a crowded coffee shop: ask for general advice, but keep your secrets to yourself.
Sources
[1] National Institute of Standards and Technology, “Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework: Generative Artificial Intelligence Profile,” NIST AI 600-1. https://www.nist.gov/publications/artificial-intelligence-risk-management-framework-generative-artificial-intelligence