Anthropic rejects Pentagon's "final offer" in AI safeguards fight

"The contract language we received overnight from the Department of War made virtually no progress on preventing Claude's use for mass surveillance of Americans or in fully autonomous weapons. New language framed as compromise was paired with legalese that would allow those safeguards to be disregarded at will. Despite DOW's recent public statements, these narrow safeguards have been the crux of our negotiations for months."

"The Pentagon this week started laying the groundwork for one consequence - blacklisting the company as a supply chain risk - by asking defense contractors including Boeing and Lockheed Martin to assess their exposure to Anthropic. Alternatively, Hegseth threatened to invoke the Defense Production Act to compel Anthropic to provide its model without any restrictions."

Anthropic and the Pentagon are in conflict over restrictions on Claude's military use. Anthropic opposes contract language permitting mass surveillance of Americans and fully autonomous weapons deployment. The Pentagon's proposed compromise includes legal loopholes undermining safeguards Anthropic has negotiated for months. The Department of War is pressuring defense contractors to assess Anthropic exposure and threatening blacklisting as a supply chain risk. Defense Secretary Hegseth has indicated potential invocation of the Defense Production Act to compel unrestricted model access. The Pentagon requires AI models for "all lawful purposes" in classified settings, a standard xAI recently accepted. OpenAI and Google negotiations for classified access are accelerating. Anthropic remains committed to continued negotiations.

Read at Axios