Is it safe to dictate passwords and sensitive information?

Do not dictate passwords, passphrases or PINs. Dictation turns your secret into text that other people can hear while you speak it, and the transcript may be stored by the service that produced it. Other sensitive information can be dictated in some cases, but only when the recognition runs on your device, no transcript is kept and the words cannot be overheard. For regulated information, a written agreement may also be required. Read the rest of this page to see which of those conditions apply to your case.

Passwords and PINs should be typed or pasted, not spoken

A password is only useful while it stays secret, and dictation exposes it in three ways. The first is that anyone within earshot can hear it as you say it. The second is that the text may outlive the moment: when dictation is sent to Apple's servers, Apple says that request history, which includes transcripts, is linked to a random identifier and may be kept for up to two years ¹. The third is that symbols are hard to speak correctly. Apple's Voice Control has a Spelling mode for passwords, web addresses and other strings that are not words, because those strings are entered one character at a time ². A password manager that fills the field, or typing the password yourself, avoids all three problems.

Secure fields are a signal, but they are not a guarantee

Many systems protect password fields, and that protection is a good sign. It is not a promise that every dictation tool respects it.

Microsoft says that fluid dictation is automatically disabled in secure fields such as passwords or PINs ³. That statement covers fluid dictation, a Copilot+ PC feature, so it does not tell you what every voice typing mode does. Apple's custom keyboard guide says that when a user taps a secure text input object, such as a password field, the system temporarily replaces a custom keyboard with the system keyboard ⁴. That protects a password field from a third-party keyboard, but it does not cover an app that reads text some other way.

The limit is real. One dictation app's help article says that standard macOS password fields are excluded automatically, but that custom or web-based password fields may be read like normal text fields ⁵. The field type decides the outcome, so test before you trust it.

Keyboards and cloud input can expose what you type

Dictation sometimes runs through a keyboard app, and a keyboard sees everything you type. Citizen Lab's 2024 study of keyboard apps found that most of the vulnerable apps it reviewed could be exploited by a passive network eavesdropper, who needs no action from the user ⁶. The same report recommends that at-risk users switch from a cloud-based keyboard app to one that works entirely on-device ⁷. Our guide to dictation app permissions covers the keyboard and permission side.

It depends: the sensitive cases need different answers

Sensitive information is a range, not one category. The table sets out the common cases.

Table 1. What to do with each kind of sensitive information

For health information, the rule is strict. HHS says that a covered entity and a cloud service provider that holds its health information must sign a HIPAA-compliant business associate agreement ⁸. A consumer privacy policy is not that agreement. Whether Apple Dictation is safe for everyday use explains why the same product can be fine for personal notes and not fine for patient records.

How to dictate sensitive text without exposing it

If you decide to dictate sensitive text, reduce the chance of exposure at each step.

1. Stop before any password, PIN or code field. Type the value, or let your password manager fill it.
2. Test the field with a made-up word. Dictate a harmless word, such as a test phrase, into the field to see whether your tool writes into it. Do not test with a real secret.
3. Confirm recognition runs on the device with the airplane test. Keep the network off while you dictate, and check the result.
4. Turn off history and sharing where the product offers the switch, then delete recent history. How to delete voice recordings lists the steps for the major platforms.
5. Check whether anyone can hear you. Move somewhere private before you dictate anything you would not say aloud.

When the answer is no

Use dictation for words you would be comfortable saying aloud in the room, and keep secrets out of it. For personal notes, the setting you choose matters more than the tool. Our question on what a dictation app's privacy policy must say gives you the four questions to answer before you rely on any app. Can AI models leak what you dictated covers the case where text reaches a model that learns from it.

Yap, which we make, is an on-device dictation app for Mac and Windows. On-device recognition reduces what leaves your computer, but it does not stop a bystander from hearing you or make a password safe to speak aloud, so the rule above still applies. The short answer is the same for every app: type or paste passwords, and dictate other sensitive text only when you have checked each condition above.