DoNotPay CEO Joshua Browder says he handed over his entire personal financial life to OpenAI's GPT-4, giving the AI access to his bank accounts, financial statements, credit report, and email. The experiment, which he detailed in a Twitter thread, saved him $217.85, according to Browder.
Browder said he used AutoGPT, an autonomous version of the model, to automate tasks through the DoNotPay chat product his company is building. The AI canceled what Browder described as useless subscriptions, including a gym membership costing $80.86 a month. It also drafted a "persuasive and firm legal letter" seeking a refund for poor WiFi on a United Airlines transatlantic flight, and negotiated more than $100 off his monthly Comcast bill, Browder claimed.
"We are building DoNotPay Chat to be available as a ChatGPT Plugin, on our website and even via iMessage," Browder tweeted. "Consumer rights is the perfect job for AI!"
Why the Claims Face Scrutiny
Browder's position as CEO of an AI startup that stands to benefit from such demonstrations warrants caution, and DoNotPay's track record has been uneven. A paralegal previously found glaring errors in the AI's ability to craft legal documents, and the company's plan to have an AI feed answers to a defendant through a hidden earpiece was halted after human prosecutors warned Browder it could lead to jail time.
The GPT-4 model itself is known to generate false information and struggles to distinguish truth from fiction, raising questions about its reliability for financial tasks. Handing over banking credentials to a chatbot also carries significant data-security risks, depending on where the information ends up.
Some Twitter users reacted skeptically. "Yeah this just smells like a personal info mining scheme," one wrote. Another said: "I see the value in what you were trying to do here, but I would almost prefer this being in a silo environment rather than GPT for connected to the Internet with access to my online banking."
The most basic objection may be practical: if you are not already reviewing bank statements to cancel unused memberships and dispute charges, the underlying problem may be a lack of financial oversight rather than a lack of AI. DoNotPay has much to prove before consumers should trust it with their most sensitive data.
Editorial Notes