An official from the US Department of Defence confirmed this to the BBC, whilst Claude was still on active duty last week, according to several sources, including those involved in operations against Iran.
The US Department of Defense no longer uses any of Anthropic's products, an official from the department told the BBC on Monday 5 October. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth had classified the company as a "supply chain risk" in February and announced a complete shutdown for the end of August: it is unclear why the deadline slipped by more than a month.
Several former defence officials and contractors interviewed by the BBC say Claude was still employed the previous week for research, analysis and intelligence, as well as in military operations targeting Iran. The tool was considered valuable for sorting through huge volumes of information. Anthropic declined to comment.
A tug-of-war over safeguards
Anthropic had been working with the administration and the military since 2024, and had been the first advanced AI lab deployed in services dealing with classified information. The break came from the company's refusal to remove Claude's protections to offer unrestricted access to the military, citing the risks of mass surveillance and autonomous weapons. Anthropic is challenging this designation in court, which it considers "unprecedented and illegal"; meanwhile, the Pentagon has signed with Google, xAI and OpenAI, whose tools are spreading in some services.
Read the full article on the original source
Go to the source →