The European Union is in talks with Anthropic PBC about getting its companies and banks tested for any vulnerabilities that the new Mythos AI model uncovers.
"Indeed there are contacts with Anthropic,” said EU Economy Minister Valdis Dombrovskis, speaking Monday night after a meeting of Eurogroup finance ministers in Brussels.
Dombrovskis said Anthropic had briefed the European Commission, the EU’s executive, on the unreleased tool’s "cyber capabilities and risks.” Ultimately, he wants European companies "to have possibilities for this cyber resiliency testing.”
Mythos, which can identify unknown flaws in IT systems, has sent a wave of anxiety across Europe, as Anthropic is limiting access to it. Officials are worried that without any information, Europe’s financial system may become exposed to digital attacks if the technology falls into the wrong hands.
"There are concerns about potential misuse,” Dombrovskis said. "That’s why it is tightly controlled how this model is being used.”
During the gathering, finance ministers pushed for European companies to see the new AI model, according to people familiar with the discussions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity as the talks are private.
"I don’t think we have the luxury of not trying to establish channels of communication with the US,” Eurogroup President Kyriakos Pierrakakis told reporters after Monday’s meeting. "The challenge here is that technologies like AI necessitate international governance frameworks at a moment when multilateralism is challenged.”
Spain’s Carlos Cuerpo pushed in the meeting for Europe to consider regulatory and legislative instruments – such as the AI Act – to help guarantee access to Anthropic’s model, the people said. Pierrakakis said the issue is so serious that ministers will need to revisit it at future gatherings, they added.
"Frontier AI models are evolving rapidly and may soon present challenges of a potentially systemic nature,” Pierrakakis said. "We must ensure a framework that supports both stability and competitiveness.” – Bloomberg
