ChatGPT web search leaked hidden debug payloads via SSE streams, OpenAI has patched it

metehan777 · x · 2026-11-07

A talk revealed that every ChatGPT web-search answer carried a hidden debug payload with queries, scores, prompt blocks and A/B test flags.
Researchers found a leak inside the SSE stream and studied hundreds of SSE dumps collected from the US, Europe and Asia.
Numbers kept shifting because ChatGPT runs many A/B tests; real values for ANN, BM25, recency and RRF came from a single dump, with broader patterns drawn from hundreds.
OpenAI patched the leak; the talk covers the roughly two-week window before the fix.

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