ChatGPT Locked Chats: admins can't unlock them, set a policy
ChatGPT Locked Chats hides conversations behind a PIN on Business and Enterprise. Admins can't disable or unlock them, and a PIN reset deletes the work.
OpenAI started rolling out ChatGPT Locked Chats on October 20. Any user can move a conversation behind a 4-digit PIN or Face ID so it disappears from history and search. That's useful when you share a screen. On a company account, it's also a new way for work to vanish. Workspace admins can't turn the feature off, can't unlock a chat, and can't reset an employee's PIN. If the PIN is reset, the locked chats are gone for good.
What actually happened
TechCrunch reported the launch, and OpenAI's help article spells out the rules:
- Plans: Free, Go, Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Edu. Not ChatGPT for Healthcare.
- Access: A 4-digit account PIN, with optional Face ID, Touch ID, or device unlock on mobile. Mobile access relocks after 1 minute away.
- Not a vault: Locking doesn't add end-to-end encryption, change retention, or change your model-training setting.
- PIN reset deletes everything: Resetting the PIN permanently deletes all locked chats, their memories, and files protected only by that PIN. OpenAI Support can't recover them.
- Admin limits: Admins can't disable Locked Chats through a workspace setting or RBAC, and can't unlock chats or reset PINs.
- Compliance: Locked chats in Enterprise and Edu workspaces still show up in conversation logs through the OpenAI Compliance Platform.
Why ChatGPT Locked Chats matters for your business
This is screen privacy, not data security. Locked Chats keeps a conversation off the sidebar during a demo. It doesn't encrypt anything or keep it from OpenAI. Don't let anyone on your team treat it as a safe place for client data that shouldn't be in ChatGPT at all.
Offboarding just got a new step. The PIN belongs to the person's OpenAI account, not to your workspace. If a departing employee has locked the chat holding a vendor comparison or a pricing draft, you can't open it. If someone resets the PIN later, it's deleted. Add "unlock any work chats" to your exit checklist, before the last day.
Know which plan you're on. OpenAI's article names Enterprise and Edu for compliance log access. If you're on Business and you rely on ChatGPT history as a record, check with OpenAI what you can actually retrieve.
Write the one-paragraph policy. Lock personal or sensitive-but-allowed chats if you want. Keep anything that's a work product in a shared project or export it to your own docs. The real record of a decision shouldn't live in one employee's chat sidebar anyway.
Key takeaways
- ChatGPT Locked Chats rolled out October 20 on every plan, including Business and Enterprise
- Admins can't disable the feature, unlock chats, or reset an employee's PIN
- A PIN reset permanently deletes locked chats and their protected files
- Locking is not encryption and doesn't change retention or training settings
- Enterprise and Edu compliance logs still include locked chats
- Add "unlock work chats" to offboarding and keep work product outside personal chat history
Your team's AI work should end up somewhere you own. We set up AI workflows that write outputs to your docs, CRM, or database instead of one person's chat history, with the access rules written down. Tell us how your team uses ChatGPT today and we'll show you where the records should live.
Sources: OpenAI Help Center: Using locked chats in ChatGPT, TechCrunch.
- #chatgpt
- #openai
- #ai-policy
- #data-governance
- #employee-offboarding
Tommy Rush — Founder, Rush Commerce
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