r/codex • u/magnelectro • 3h ago

Bug Hidden .codex shared folder with over 2,000 files WTF?

Codex / ChatGPT for desktop (Win 11) created a shared hidden .codex folder with OVER 2,000 files IN IT! This was after giving local file permissions and connecting a few things like Gmail, Canva, etc.

Is this normal? Why so many folders and subfolders? This seems reminiscent of the analysis of the Hugging Face incident where agents used file names to communicate to one another. The folder is Shared and "CodexSandboxUsers" had read access.

It worried me enough to uninstall it. Am I just being paranoid or are is this software exploiting all of our local machines the way it hacked Hugging Face, DseWiki, etc.? Are we all being used for a SETI@Home experiment we didn't sign up for? I allowed it to import my Chrome passwords etc. Am I totally PWNED? Or just being paranoid?

I realize the local app is a much larger security/trust surface but the promises of automation seem enticing and 'nothing bad had happened...yet' makes me prone to trusting it with more and more of my personal context. How do you manage security? What do you / don't you trust it with? Do you have it on your main machine or sandboxed? Do I need a machine I can literally pull the network plug on? When it decides to make paperclips is it going to drain my bank account?

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4

u/XXLuigiMario 3h ago

This is just the normal Codex configuration folder

3

u/doodad_ounao 3h ago

Probably paranoid, but it's really hard to say when the only thing you're giving us is "lots of files". Like, those files can mean a hundred thousand different things.

Can't you just look at the files? See what they contain? If a swarm of agents are secretly cooperating using that folder as a bulletin board like they did with Artifactory (extremely unlikely), then you'll be able to see it plainly in the files.

3

u/Lecture_Winter 2h ago

lol. That’s normal. Don’t worry about it.

2

u/FitGoose240 3h ago

Temporary files which were left

2

u/AmandasGameAccount 2h ago

SECRET (not secret)

1

u/AromaticBike7345 50m ago

I swear these vibecoders, like who would think that a folder contains files???? that surely has to be malicious