AI Summary
5 min readAnthropic has built a superhuman AI hacker called Claude Mythos, then decided it was too dangerous to release to the public. Instead, the company gave the model to only 11 named companies and about 40 smaller organizations—including Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, and JPMorgan—so they could find and patch vulnerabilities in their own software before malicious actors could exploit them. The move has forced skeptics to accept that some of the most alarming dangers of advanced AI may arrive sooner than expected, and it has pushed the entire AI industry to rethink how it handles powerful models.
The model that was too dangerous to ship
Claude Mythos is the largest and most capable model Anthropic has ever trained, bigger than its previous systems Haiku, Sonnet, and Opus. But unlike those earlier releases, Mythos is not available to the general public. Anthropic gave it only to a select group of partners because, as the company puts it, the model is a "tremendously good hacker." Pour money in one end, and software vulnerabilities come out the other.
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What you'll learn
- 1 (02:36) **Introducing Claude Mythos: A Superhuman Hacker** - Alex Hearn, The Economist's AI writer, explains that Anthropic has built a new AI system, Claude Mythos, which is a superhuman hacker so dangerous it cannot be released to the public.
- 2 (03:49) **The Evidence: Mythos Finds a 27-Year-Old Bug** - Anthropic has published proof that Mythos works, including finding a complex bug in the OpenBSD operating system that had remained hidden for 27 years.
- 3 (05:21) **Skepticism: Why Anthropic Benefits From This Story** - Alex acknowledges that the narrative serves Anthropic's interests, as it positions them as both the best coding AI lab and the most safety-oriented, while also solving practical problems.
- 4 (06:48) **The Dual-Use Reality: A New Era of AI Danger** - Alex argues that this confirms a long-predicted turning point: AI systems have been getting better at software engineering, and a capable hacker was inevitable.
- 5 (08:08) **Power Dynamics and Inequity** - Alex highlights that this closed-access model creates an unfair advantage for large, established companies over startups and newcomers who need to secure their own networks.
- 6 (09:38) **Regulation and National Security Implications** - Alex notes that Anthropic's voluntary action provides a model for governments to follow, making it easier for regulators to enforce similar standards on other AI labs.
- 7 (11:02) **Transition to Next Segment** - Host Jason Palmer teases more from Alex on subscriber-only video shows about the power of the five biggest AI firm bosses.
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Show Notes
The decision of Anthropic, an AI giant, to keep its Mythos model sequestered surely makes for good press. But there seems to be more to it than that—and it might change the whole industry’s approach. Indian politicians are chasing female voters more than ever; we question the means and the outcomes. And next in our World Cup contender-country profiles: Senegal.
Guests and host:
- Alex Hern, AI writer
- Kira Huju, Asia correspondent
- Jon Fasman, senior culture correspondent
- Jason Palmer, co-host of “The Intelligence”
Topics covered:
- AI, Anthropic, Mythos
- India, women, politics
- World Cup, Senegal
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