Based in San Francisco, OpenAI announced on Thursday that it will roll out a search feature for paid ChatGPT users, with plans to extend access to all users in the future. A preview version was made available in July to a select group of users and publishers.
The initial iteration of ChatGPT, launched in 2022, was trained on extensive online text but lacked the ability to provide answers regarding current events not included in its training data.
In May, Google transformed its search engine by incorporating AI-generated summaries that often appear at the top of search results. These summaries are designed to quickly address user queries, reducing the need to click through to other websites for additional information.
Google's redesign followed a year of testing with a limited user group, yet it still encountered issues with inaccuracies, highlighting the risks associated with relying on AI chatbots that can produce erroneous information, known as hallucinations.
The shift by AI companies to have their chatbots deliver news sourced from professional journalists has raised concerns among some media organizations. The New York Times is one of several outlets that have filed lawsuits against OpenAI and its partner Microsoft for copyright violations. Additionally, News Corp, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal and New York Post, took legal action against another AI search engine, Perplexity, earlier this month.
In a blog post on Thursday, OpenAI stated that its new search engine was developed with input from news partners, including The Associated Press and News Corp. The company indicated that the search feature will provide links to sources, such as news articles and blog posts, although it remains unclear if these links will directly correspond to the original sources of the information presented by the chatbot.