Granola Notes: Default Link Settings Expose Your Notes

Users of the AI-powered note-taking application, Granola, are advised to review their privacy configurations. Despite Granola's assertion that notes are "private by default," the platform's default settings render them accessible to anyone possessing a link and utilizes them for internal AI model training unless a user explicitly opts out.

Granola positions itself as an "AI notepad for people in back-to-back meetings." Its functionality involves integrating with a user's calendar to capture meeting audio, subsequently employing artificial intelligence to generate a bulleted summary, referred to as a "note." Users have the capability to edit these AI-generated notes, invite collaborators for viewing, and leverage Granola's AI assistant to query their notes and access the underlying meeting transcripts.

However, within the app’s settings menu, Granola explicitly states, "By default, your notes are viewable to anyone with the link." This implies that inadvertent sharing of a link could expose sensitive meeting content to anyone on the internet. Independent testing confirmed this, demonstrating that a user's note could be accessed from a private browser window without logging into a Granola account. The platform even displays the note's owner and creation timestamp.

While full transcript access was not available under these conditions, portions of the transcript could still be viewed. Selecting a bullet point generated by Granola would reveal a relevant quote from the transcript, accompanied by an AI-generated summary providing additional context to the discussion.

Granola's website indicates that "full transcript access is available to collaborators who open the same folder or note inside the Granola desktop app." It remains unclear whether this access extends to any Granola account holder or is restricted solely to individuals with whom a workspace has been explicitly shared. Granola did not provide a response to requests for further clarification by the time of publication.

To modify default link sharing preferences, users can open Granola, select their profile located in the bottom-left corner, and then choose "Settings." From there, navigate to the "Default link sharing" option and change the setting from "Anyone with the link" to either "Only my company" or "Private." Deleting a note will revoke access for anyone who previously held the link.

Concerns regarding the public notes setting were highlighted last year by a user on LinkedIn, who noted, "these links aren’t indexed, but if you share or leak one – even accidentally – it’s public to whoever finds it." Furthermore, a source informed The Verge that at least one major corporation has prohibited a senior executive from using the tool due to security apprehensions.

Additionally, Granola's support page indicates that the company "may use anonymized data" to enhance its AI models. While enterprise customers are automatically opted out of this AI training, users on all other plans are opted in by default. Users can disable this feature by accessing the settings menu and toggling off the "Use my data to improve models for everyone" option. The company affirms that it does not permit third-party entities, such as OpenAI or Anthropic, to utilize user data for AI training, even if this setting is enabled.

Granola's security page outlines that user notes are stored in a US-hosted Amazon Web Services private cloud and are "encrypted at rest and in transit." The company clarifies that it does not store audio from meetings, retaining only meeting notes and transcripts, both of which are processed in the cloud.