(Web Desk) – Anthropic announced on Friday that it will suspend access to its most advanced artificial intelligence models after the US government ordered the company to restrict their use by foreign nationals over national security concerns.
In a statement, the AI firm said it had received an export control directive requiring it to halt access to its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models for all foreign users. According to Anthropic, authorities did not provide detailed evidence to support the national security concerns behind the order.
The company said it understands that the government believes there may be a way to bypass, or “jailbreak”, safeguards designed to prevent Fable 5 from being used to identify software vulnerabilities.
Anthropic noted that the directive came as tensions between the company and the Trump administration had begun to ease following earlier disagreements over the military use of AI technologies.
Relations between the two sides deteriorated after Anthropic reportedly declined to allow its AI systems to be used for domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons programmes. The government subsequently placed the company on a supply chain blacklist scheduled to take effect later this year.
The move represents a significant expansion of US efforts to curb the capabilities of foreign adversaries in artificial intelligence. Previous export controls largely focused on restricting access to advanced chips and technologies rather than limiting the use of AI models themselves.
Anthropic said the government had presented only verbal evidence of a “potential narrow, non-universal jailbreak” and argued that such findings did not justify withdrawing commercially deployed models used by millions of people.
The company warned that applying the same standard across the AI industry could effectively halt the rollout of new frontier AI systems.
Earlier this week, Anthropic introduced Claude Fable 5, part of a new generation of “Mythos-class” models equipped with safeguards restricting use in sensitive areas such as cybersecurity. Experts have cautioned that highly capable AI systems could accelerate sophisticated cyberattacks if misused.
Anthropic said it is working with authorities to resolve what it described as a misunderstanding and hopes to restore access to the affected models as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, Amazon Web Services confirmed that Anthropic had requested the suspension of access to the models for all users globally to comply with the directive. A US official also confirmed that the Commerce Department had ordered the restriction of Fable 5 and Mythos 5 access for foreign nationals.
