Calvin Wankhede / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Last week, the US government issued an emergency national security directive that forced Anthropic to pull its advanced Fable 5 and Mythos 5 AI models globally.
- Anthropic’s Managing Director of International has now stated the company is “very confident” the models will become available again in the coming days.
- Reports allege the freeze stemmed from US concerns over South Korean partner SK Telecom being included in “Project Glasswing” due to alleged ties to China.
Speaking at a press conference in Seoul, Mr. Chris Ciauri, Anthropic’s Managing Director of International, stated that the company is “very confident that in the coming days, the models will become available again,” as reported by Korea JoongAng Daily.
The event in South Korea was initially intended to mark Anthropic’s expansion in the region. However, questions about recent export controls and Anthropic’s Project Glasswing program (which grants access to Mythos 5 only to select entities) dominated the discussion. The executive declined to comment on most questions related to the shutdown.
The US government’s security anxiety centers heavily on Mythos 5. Unlike more consumer-focused models, Mythos 5 has been heavily guarded due to its advanced capability to scan, identify, and fix severe vulnerabilities in highly complex, supposedly unbreakable codebases. In the hands of a bad actor, that same capability can be reversed to discover and exploit critical infrastructure flaws. To manage this risk, Anthropic restricted Mythos access to an exclusive corporate cybersecurity initiative called “Project Glasswing.”
Project Glasswing has approximately 150 partners, according to Anthropic, including Google, NVIDIA, Microsoft, and Apple. However, Wired reports that the US’s export controls materialized following a spat with Anthropic over including South Korean telecom giant SK Telecom in Project Glasswing and granting it access to Claude Mythos 5. Citing “people familiar with the matter,” the report notes that US officials were concerned about what they alleged were SK Telecom’s ties to China.
Anthopic declined to comment on Wired‘s report, while the White House and SK Telecom did not respond. An SK Telecom representative told South Korea’s The Chosun Daily, “The anonymous insider’s remarks in foreign media lack verified facts, and our company has no ties to China.”
For paying customers currently locked out of Anthropic’s most capable systems, the focus now shifts to whether the company’s incoming regional guardrails and security patches will be enough to appease Washington and get the models back online soon enough.
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