Anthropic's latest AI model strikes fear into banks

Mythos required an emergency meeting between government officials and bank leaders

An impromptu meeting of bank CEOs and federal officials was held in the nation's capital this week because of the destructive capabilities of Anthropic's latest AI model, Claude Mythos, which can detect cybersecurity flaws in operating systems and web browsers with exponentially more efficiency than human hackers.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gathered the heads of Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo on Tuesday after the limited rollout of Mythos, per Bloomberg. The emergency meeting is a sign that the Trump administration thinks that while Mythos is intended to protect companies from hackers, it could be used to attack the foundation of the US financial system by going after the biggest banks in the world.

What's so scary?

Anthropic distributed Mythos to only ~40 organizations, which includes major banks, according to Bloomberg, because its CEO said it's too powerful for a full release to the public. CNBC reported that the company also briefed government officials on its capabilities before the release. So, how dangerous is it?

• Officials believe Mythos can cripple Fortune 100 companies, infiltrate national defense systems, and take down huge chunks of the Internet, according to Axios.

• A security expert told Business Insider that a team of humans can discover about 100 critical flaws with no immediate fixes per year (not including what happens on bad first dates), but Mythos can find "thousands."

Offense vs. defense: Mythos is equally capable of identifying and exploiting weaknesses in a system. Experts told BI that this gives the advantage to hackers in the short term. But as widespread adoption occurs, the edge shifts back to those defending themselves.

Safety net: Regulators require banks to hold capital in reserve in case of unexpected losses from events that include data breaches and cyberattacks. But banks have complained that they require too much, and a proposal from the Fed last month, if approved, would ease some of the requirements.

Zoom out: The concerns over Mythos come as Anthropic is fighting the Trump administration over being designated a supply chain risk by the Pentagon after limiting the use of its AI tech in war. -- DL