OpenAI’s ChatGPT Gov is a new tailored version of ChatGPT designed to provide US government agencies with an additional way to access OpenAI’s frontier models. In the blog post, the company said that by making ChatGPT available to the US government, OpenAI aims to ensure “AI serves the national interest and the public good, aligned with democratic values, while empowering policymakers to responsibly integrate these capabilities to deliver better services to the American people.”
OpenAI said the agencies can deploy ChatGPT Gov in their own Microsoft Azure commercial cloud, and will have access to many of the features and capabilities of ChatGPT Enterprise, including custom GPTs. The blog stated that ChatGPT Gov will help agencies control their own security, privacy, and compliance needs, including strict cybersecurity standards like IL5, CJIS, ITAR, and FedRAMP High. This setup can also speed up internal approval for using OpenAI’s tools with sensitive, non-public data.
Kevin Weil, OpenAI CPO, posted on X (formerly Twitter) that the ChatGPT Gov delivers “enormous potential tools to support the public sector in tackling complex challenges, from improving public health and infrastructure to strengthening national security.”
OpenAI’s ChatGPT Gov has similar features as ChatGPT Enterprise
In the blog post, the company listed a few features, claiming that the features overlap with ChatGPT Enterprise. But these features come with enhanced security. As per the company, it allows government officials to save and share conversations within a secure workspace, as well as upload text and image files. Powered by the GPT-4o flagship model, it also enables employees to create and share custom GPTs within their workspace.
This launch follows widespread adoption of OpenAI’s AI technology across various government levels. More than 90,000 government employees have used ChatGPT, generating over 18 million prompts for tasks like document translation, drafting policy memos, code development, and application creation, according to the company.
OpenAI is also pursuing FedRAMP accreditation for ChatGPT Enterprise, the foundation of ChatGPT Gov, to ensure compliance with government security standards.
The launch follows a post by CEO Sam Altman on X, where he announced plans to accelerate certain releases. This was his first public comment after the low-cost Chinese AI startup DeepSeek disrupted AI-related stocks on Monday. Altman referred to DeepSeek as a “new competitor” after its free AI assistant surpassed ChatGPT in downloads on Apple’s App Store. The model’s rapid rise has prompted US tech investors to take a closer look at the billions of dollars committed to expanding AI operations.
