For investigators, AI chat logs can provide valuable insights into a suspect's mindset and motive.
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Days before two University of South Florida graduate students went missing last month, a roommate of one of the students allegedly asked the AI chatbot ChatGPT an unusual question.

"What happens if a human has a put (sic) in a black garbage bag and thrown in a dumpster," Hisham Abugharbieh asked on 13 April, according to an affidavit filed by Florida prosecutors.

ChatGPT responded it sounded dangerous, the document states, and Abugharbieh then asked another question: "How would they find out?"

Those alleged entries to ChatGPT, included in court documents charging Abugharbieh with two counts of first-degree murder, are just the latest instance of investigators using AI chat histories as evidence in criminal investigations.

A ChatGPT conversation was similarly used in the Los Angeles wildfires arson case and a Snapchat AI conversation was key evidence in a 2024 murder trial in Virginia.

For investigators, these chat logs can provide valuable insights into a suspect's mindset and motive.

"I think any communications with AI chatbots is like a treasure trove for law enforcement agencies," said Ilia Kolochenko, a cybersecurity expert and attorney in Washington DC.

"[Suspects] believe their interactions with AI will remain confidential, or will at least remain undisclosed or undiscovered, so they frequently ask very straightforward, very direct questions."

The criminal cases underscore the growing use of AI chatbots for personal advice and the lack of privacy protections for those conversations.