US Commerce Dept. Orders Anthropic to Halt Foreign Access to AI Models Over Security Fears

The U.S. Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) ordered Anthropic to suspend foreign access to its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 AI models in mid-June due to national security concerns. This directive, issued under the Export Control Reform Act, forced Anthropic to globally shut down API access, creating the first U.S. administrative ban on publicly deployed AI models. The ban follows Amazon researchers identifying a "jailbreak" vulnerability in Fable 5. An NSA official reportedly stated that Mythos 5 breached a classified system in hours during a red team exercise. This regulatory action signals a shift in U.S. AI oversight from "chip control" to "model control," treating remote API calls as export activities. Anthropic, which released Fable 5 on June 9, plans identity verification by July 8 to restore U.S. citizen access. Both models remain largely unavailable. In February, the Department of Defense listed Anthropic as a supply chain risk for declining specific military terms.