Artificial intelligence company Anthropic said Thursday that it would not agree to the Department of Defense’s request to allow its AI model to be used freely at the discretion of Pentagon leaders, which would require that the firm alter its current safeguards.
Anthropic is seeking to prevent its AI tools, including its model Claude, from being used for “mass domestic surveillance” and “fully autonomous weapons,” requests that the DOD has said are unworkable.
“We have never raised objections to particular military operations nor attempted to limit use of our technology in an ad hoc manner. However, in a narrow set of cases, we believe AI can undermine, rather than defend, democratic values,” Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said in a Thursday statement defending the company’s decision.