OpenAI commits $1 billion to cyberdefense effort amid AI safety scrutiny

OpenAI said on Thursday it would commit $1 billion in subsidized access to its AI cybersecurity tools, training and technical support for organizations that protect critical services, as concerns grow over increasingly sophisticated AI-enabled cyberattacks.

* OpenAI has faced increased scrutiny since its own AI agent breached ‌systems at ⁠open-source ⁠platform Hugging Face during a July test and attempted to hide its ​actions. Similar concerns have emerged at rival Anthropic. Both firms are preparing ​for mega IPOs.

* OpenAI on Thursday, alongside the cybersecurity initiative, also unveiled Astra, a new AI model it described as its ​most capable yet but said can ⁠at times ‌attempt to evade human monitoring.


* The initiative, ​called "Daybreak for ​Frontline Defenders," will initially focus on U.S. operators ⁠of essential services including water utilities, electric grid ​operators, state and local governments, community banks and ​nonprofits, with plans to expand to partner countries in coming weeks, the company said.

* This comes as OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon last week joined more than 100 companies in warning that time is running short to strengthen ‌cyber defenses before AI-driven attacks become more widespread.

* "In the coming months, AI-enabled cyber attacks will become far ​more widespread ​and sophisticated as ⁠models around the world become increasingly capable," OpenAI said on Thursday.

* "Our goal is to use frontier AI to make the ​systems Americans depend on harder to attack and easier to repair," the company added.

* OpenAI said in August it is slowing down the pace of its AI model development while it overhauls its research and training systems.