Anthropic announced an expansion of its Claude Startups program, which launched in May and already counts thousands of participating companies. New members can get up to $45,000 in discounts and credits through a 'Claude Startup Stack,' plus a one-time $1,000 API credit and a free year of Claude Team for up to five seats. Startups founded within the last five years or funded within the last two years are eligible to apply.
Anthropic announced an expanded version of its Claude for Startups program during SF Tech Week, offering eligible companies a free year of Claude Team with up to five premium seats and $1,000 in API credits. Participants also gain access to the Claude Marketplace for building plug-ins and can schedule virtual sessions with Anthropic's Applied AI team. Eligibility requires companies to have been founded within the last five years or funded within the last two years.
In an interview with Politico's Decoded, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the world should accept some bad outcomes from AI in exchange for the technology's benefits and people's agency to use it. He contrasted OpenAI's lighter-touch regulatory stance with stricter AI-safety advocates like Anthropic, and said he would not trade away such benefits merely to prevent hacks, scams or misuse.
Mistral introduced its latest AI model, ML4, which boasts 1 trillion parameters and is designed for tasks in cybersecurity, coding, manufacturing, finance, and multimodal applications. The company claims it ranks among the top open models globally and plans to release it to developers and government officials before a broader launch later this month.
Several major South Korean banks, including Hana Bank, KB Kookmin Bank, and Shinhan Bank, are under investigation following cyberattacks that used AI agents to breach their systems. Personal information of around 25,000 Shinhan customers and dozens of employees from Kookmin Bank and Hana Bank have been leaked. Authorities and President Lee Jae Myung have expressed concern over the use of AI in these attacks, which appear to be part of a growing trend of autonomous cyber threats targeting financial institutions.
A small group of activists from the 'Pull The Plug' movement staged a direct action against Nvidia by interrupting a dinner attended by a senior executive. The protesters unfurled banners and filmed their disruption, aiming to challenge the AI industry's development practices. The event was part of broader protests targeting AI firms like Palantir and Anthropic in London.
A woman in Florida was arrested after her conversation with Anthropic’s chatbot Claude was flagged for threatening violence. Human reviewers at Anthropic identified the chat as a credible threat and notified authorities, leading to her arrest. The user was unaware that her chat history could be accessed by company staff, highlighting ongoing concerns over privacy and safety in AI interactions.
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, expressed concerns about the dangers of advancing artificial intelligence in a recent interview, suggesting that society must accept certain risks as unavoidable. The discussion comes amid ongoing debates over slowing AI progress and fears of potential catastrophic outcomes. Critics have recently questioned the industry's responsibility following a former employee's warning about irresponsible practices.
A woman in Florida was detained after Anthropic's review team flagged a conversation with its AI model Claude, in which she allegedly threatened to attack the Lee County Sheriff's Office and mentioned acquiring a firearm. The company reported the incident to authorities, leading to her arrest on a felony charge for making threats of violence. Court records show the charge was filed on September 30 under Florida law concerning threats of mass violence.
Security researchers report that malicious actors are probing Rejetto HFS servers for a critical vulnerability, CVE-2026-61500, which affects versions 3.0.0 to 3.2.0. The flaw involves weak session cookie signing due to non-cryptographic random number generation, enabling attackers to forge administrator sessions and execute remote code. Observations indicate the scans originate from a China Telecom IP address targeting servers in Japan and the US.
A US Department of Defence official told the BBC the Pentagon has ceased using Anthropic's products, months after Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth labelled the company a national security supply-chain risk in February. Sources told the BBC that until last week Claude was still being used for research, intelligence analysis and operations tied to Iran, and the full cutoff had not previously been reported.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in an interview that the world should accept some negative outcomes from AI, including scams and misuse, in exchange for broader access to the technology and the good it can do. He contrasted this stance with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's approach, rejecting the idea that a single AI lab should control the technology to prevent harm. Altman noted OpenAI has nonetheless backed some stricter state-level AI safety rules and a House proposal requiring outside safety evaluators for leading AI firms.
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