The artificial intelligence tool that its own maker said was too dangerous for public use is now being pulled from all users – after President Donald Trump banned foreign nationals from accessing it, citing national security.
Anthropic on Tuesday released Claude Fable 5, a version of its powerful Claude Mythos AI program, which had previously been restricted to a small group of organisations for previewing and testing because of concerns it could exploit or hack computer systems. “Fable's capabilities exceed those of any model we've ever made generally available,” the company said at launch, adding that “releasing a model this capable comes with risks”.
“Anthropic released then suspended AI model Fable 5 after Trump banned foreign access.”
But within days, the US government ordered Anthropic to block non-American users from accessing Fable 5 and its sibling Mythos 5, prompting the company to suspend the models entirely for all users, according to City A.M. The ban follows warnings from technology, finance and government leaders about the tool’s potential to pose financial security risks, with Canadian Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne telling the BBC in April that the attention was warranted partly because “it's the unknown, unknown”.
Anthropic had said Fable 5 would be released with safeguards and user limitations, and that the roughly 150 groups that had been previewing Mythos would now get access to Claude Mythos 5 without restrictions on cybersecurity or biology, depending on their use. Those groups had already reported finding more than 10,000 critical security flaws in their systems using the earlier version.
The company, now valued at nearly $1tn (£747bn) and expected to go public soon, said both Fable and Mythos could work “unattended” on human commands for longer periods “than any previous Claude models”. Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark told BBC Newsnight last week that AI tools were expanding so rapidly that “you want the option to be able to take your foot off the gas and put your foot on the brake”.
The Trump administration’s sudden ban – and Anthropic’s immediate suspension – has left users and investors questioning whether the most capable AI ever made will ever see widespread use.