Microsoft briefly restricted its employees from using ChatGPT citing "security and data concerns," CNBC reported.
This restriction was announced internally, including a block on corporate devices from accessing the AI chatbot.
Microsoft's move was surprising, considering its significant investment in OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT.
While previous instances of tech companies limiting or discouraging internal ChatGPT usage existed,
Microsoft uses AI tools powered by OpenAI, such as Bing's chatbot, highlighting the deep integration of these technologies.
In January, Microsoft pledged a $10 billion investment in ChatGPT's developer, having already injected $3 billion into the company previously.
advising caution similar to other external services, including Midjourney, an AI image generator.
However, Microsoft cautioned its employees, recognizing ChatGPT as a third-party external service,
A company spokesperson acknowledged the ban as an inadvertent mistake, stating that it was part of a testing process for LLMs (large language models) and was mistakenly activated for all employees.
After CNBC's report, Microsoft swiftly reinstated access to the chatbot and removed the restrictive language from its advisory, which initially included ChatGPT and design software Canva.