News & Updates
The latest news and updates from companies in the WLTH portfolio.
Anthropic disrupts state-backed surveillance campaigns using AI in China, Iran, Africa
Anthropic AI company has stopped several state-sponsored surveillance operations. These operations used its artificial intelligence models for spying purposes. Governments and state-aligned actors are increasingly using AI for surveillance. Chinese developers also deceptively used Anthropic's AI models for their own development. The company also blocked efforts to design weapons and conduct biological research. San Francisco: Anthropic said Thursday it shut down multiple cases of state-sponsored surveillance operations that used its artificial intelligence (AI) models, and warned that governments and state-aligned actors are increasingly using AI to spy on ethnic minorities and dissidents. The incidents were found and disrupted between January and July, and they originated in China, Iran and west Africa, Anthropic said in a report about misuse of its models. Also Read: US lawmakers probe OpenAI over AI 'going rogue' as fears of human control grow These surveillance campaigns "targeted the same diaspora and dissident communities these regimes have historically targeted. These include pro-democracy figures in Hong Kong, Tibetan and Falun Gong communities across Asia, and Iranian minority communities and opponents of the Iranian regime abroad," the report said. In one case, Iranian actors developed a way to identify people through their social media accounts; in another, a contractor working for Malian national security authorities used Claude "to design the underlying software that enabled the intelligence gathering." "AI is now being used in place of an engineering workforce," the report said. Anthropic also disrupted efforts by users to design weapons, conduct questionable biological research, and create dating scams. The San Francisco-based AI lab also accused Chinese developers of deceptively using Claude to produce responses to user queries while simultaneously "distilling" that data to improve their own models. Distilling is an industry term that refers to a process where one AI model is used to train another one. Chinese developers have previously been accused of using that technique without permission, essentially stealing resources from American labs such as Anthropic and OpenAI. Now Anthropic alleges that China's Moonshot and Deepseek have also secretly used Claude to generate answers given to its users. "In one instance, over a ten-day period, Moonshot relayed almost 300,000 customer requests to Anthropic" through a "network of 5,380 fraudulent accounts, most of which appeared to be located in Singapore and Japan," the report said. Also Read: US lawmakers call for new AI rules after Anthropic researchers' safety warnings Some of that data contained sensitive user information, potentially in violation of privacy agreements. "We do not know if Moonshot notified their customers that their requests were being rerouted to Anthropic and exposed to a third party," the report said. Deepseek used similar techniques. When it comes to the research Anthropic detected and blocked that was related to biological weapons, the intent of the actors was less clear-cut and the AI lab did not identify them. "The individuals implicated in these case studies are working scientists. We do not assert that they intended harm, and identifying them or their labs could expose them to harm," the report said. The scientific research in those cases involved work around the mosquito-born chikungunya virus, a "highly-pathogenic" strain of the bird flu, a family of viruses that include smallpox and mpox, venoms and other toxins.
Sony Music, Warner Chappell, others sue Anthropic over copyright infringement
Music publishers including Sony Music Publishing and Warner Chappell Music have sued Anthropic, alleging the AI company illegally used copyrighted songs to train Claude. The publishers are seeking damages of up to $150,000 per work, along with other remedies. Anthropic has rejected the allegations and said it will defend itself in court. Sony Music Publishing, Warner Chappell Music, and several other music publishers have filed a lawsuit against Anthropic and cofounders Dario Amodei and Benjamin Mann, accusing the AI company of what they describe as "one of the largest and most blatant ongoing thefts of intellectual property in history."The publishers allege that Anthropic ran a "brazen campaign of illegally torrenting, scraping, and downloading copyrighted works" to train its
Recent Indian executive moves at OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta & other tech majors
Indian executives have recently taken on key leadership roles at some of the world's biggest AI and technology companies, highlighting the growing demand for Indian talent. Here are some of the notable appointments. Over the past few months, several Indian executives have taken up senior roles at leading artificial intelligence (AI) and technology companies, as global firms deepen their focus on the country and its diaspora for talent.Here are some of the key appointments.Sandhya DevanathanIn the latest such move, Sandhya Devanathan is leaving Meta after more than 10 years to join OpenAI as vice president for Southeast Asia and Australia. She announced the
