Trump administration forced Anthropic to pull two AI models offline citing national security concerns, but cybersecurity experts and analysts suggest the move may stem as much from political friction as genuine risk.

What happened: The Trump administration ordered Anthropic to take its two newest AI models—Fable 5 and Mythos 5—offline, citing national security concerns without disclosing specifics. The order stated the models could not be used by foreign nationals; Anthropic chose to remove them entirely rather than police user nationality. Reports indicated Amazon researchers found a way to bypass Fable 5's guardrails, and Amazon CEO Andy Jassy raised these concerns with the White House.

Why it matters: Leading cybersecurity experts signed an open letter asking Trump to revoke the order, saying it is actually dangerous to pull these advanced cybersecurity capabilities from U.S. network defenders. Independent security analysis suggests the actual risk from Anthropic is not unique—other AI models have similar jailbreaks—raising questions about whether the move is retaliatory given the existing lawsuit between the Trump administration and Anthropic and the government's prior labeling of Anthropic as a supply chain risk.

What to watch: Paradoxically, past tensions between Anthropic and the Trump administration appear to have boosted the company: downloads of Claude rose during the last major public clash. Anthropic itself faces scrutiny for messaging—it warned a week before Fable's release that AI needed to slow down due to safety concerns, then launched what it calls an exceptionally powerful model, inviting the intensive government oversight now underway.