Indian-American cyber agency chief reportedly shared sensitive documents on ChatGPT. What happened?
&imwidth=600&imheight=450&format=webp&quality=medium "Indian-American cyber agency chief reportedly shared sensitive documents on ChatGPT. What happened?")
Representative Image Photograph: (ANI)
Gottumukkala, reportedly sought special approval from the agency’s Office of the Chief Information Officer to use ChatGPT after he joined the department in May.
In a serious data breach the acting head of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Madhu Gottumukkala, uploaded sensitive contracting document into a public version of ChatGPT, according to Politico that cites four Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials. The data uploaded last summer (Breach) has triggered multiple automated security warnings.
Gottumukkala, reportedly sought special approval from the agency’s Office of the Chief Information Officer to use ChatGPT after he joined the department in May.
In August last year the cybersecurity sensors at CISA flagged the uploads with multiple of them being reported in the first week of the month itself. After the breach DHS immediately sprang to action and did an internal review to check any harm done to government security.
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So far, it is not clear what conclusion did the DHS officials investigating the breach reached at.
Gottumukkala had permission to use AI
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Speaking to Politico, the CISA Director of Public Affairs Marci McCarthy said, “Acting Director Dr Madhu Gottumukkala last used ChatGPT in mid-July 2025 under an authorised temporary exception granted to some employees. CISA's security posture remains to block access to ChatGPT by default unless granted an exception.”
Though, none of the documents were classified, they included contracting files marked “for official use only,” which is still considered to be sensitive data, said officials.
McCarthy said that "Gottumukkala was granted permission to use ChatGPT with DHS controls in place." However, “this use was short-term and limited," she further said adding that the department uses “AI and other cutting-edge technologies to drive governmen.
“this use was short-term and limited.” She emphasised that the agency continues to harness “AI and other cutting-edge technologies to drive government modernisation."
The uploaded sensitive contracting document into a public version of ChatGPT has high probability to be shared with OpenAI and may be used to generate responses for other users, reported Politico.
