White House Forced Anthropic to Cut Off SK Telecom Before Model Pullback
Anthropic pulled its most advanced AI models offline days after the White House ordered it to revoke SK Telecom's access.
The White House quietly ordered Anthropic to cut off South Korea's SK Telecom from its AI systems over alleged ties to China. Days later, Anthropic took its most advanced AI models offline entirely.
The sequence of events reveals that the administration's move to restrict Anthropic's Mythos 5 model didn't happen in a vacuum. It was preceded by a direct order targeting a specific foreign telecom giant's access to cutting-edge AI capabilities.
SK Telecom, one of South Korea's largest carriers, found itself in the crosshairs due to purported Chinese connections. The White House apparently deemed that relationship a national security concern serious enough to intervene directly in Anthropic's business relationships.
The revelations, reported by Wired, paint a picture of increasingly aggressive executive action over who gets access to America's most powerful AI systems — and who doesn't.