Anthropic makes last-ditch effort to salvage deal with Pentagon after blowup

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is reportedly in talks with the Department of Defense to salvage a crucial deal after public feuding caused negotiations to collapse. The dispute centers on Anthropic's refusal to grant the Pentagon unrestricted access to its Claude AI, specifically concerning mass surveillance of Americans and lethal autonomous weapons. The situation escalated when Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth threatened to designate Anthropic a 'supply chain risk,' which would severely impact its ability to work on defense contracts. Furthermore, a leaked memo from Amodei criticized OpenAI's deal as "safety theater" and suggested Anthropic's troubles stemmed from not donating to or praising Donald Trump, unlike OpenAI executives. Anthropic is attempting to secure a deal under its existing terms, which the DoD had nearly accepted before demanding the removal of a specific clause regarding bulk data analysis.

(Source：The Verge)