Now ChatGPT can access your Drive or Dropbox documents: Is it a good idea?

OpenAI has introduced a powerful update to ChatGPT that enables direct access to cloud storage services like Google Drive, Dropbox, Box, OneDrive and SharePoint. While this innovation aims to enhance productivity by letting users interact directly with their documents, it also raises questions about data privacy, control and enterprise trust.

A new way to work with your own documents

These new connectors allow ChatGPT to search, analyze and summarize documents across different cloud platforms. Users can ask questions, request summaries or generate reports based on the content of PDFs, Excel sheets, Word documents and more. This functionality is currently limited to ChatGPT Team, Enterprise and Edu users, maintaining existing access permissions and citing original sources automatically.

Deep Research and automatic meeting notes

OpenAI has also launched “Deep Research”, a feature designed for more complex analysis across multiple documents. In parallel, ChatGPT can now record meetings and generate timestamped notes automatically, a significant leap for corporate workflows, especially during brainstorming sessions or internal reviews.

Privacy concerns remain in focus

Despite these productivity gains, the move introduces privacy trade-offs. For premium users, OpenAI claims that data from connected apps is not used to train its models. However, users of free or Plus plans with certain settings enabled might still have their data contribute to future model improvements. Additionally, ChatGPT’s Memory can retain access-relevant content for improved performance, increasing concerns over long-term data use.

A strategic push into the enterprise world

OpenAI’s update is part of a broader strategy to gain traction in the enterprise space. With over 3 million paying business users, the company is now competing directly with giants like Google and Microsoft by embedding AI deeper into everyday workflows.