Thread

1. ApolloFortyNine · 1790356118 · focus · HN ↗

   I know everyone says this is political but it actually seems like a textbook designation. Anthropic wanted to have rules on how the military used AI, the military said no and therefore doesn't want anthropic used anywhere in their supply line.

   This is like a pen manufacturer not wanting their pens used to sign drone strike orders, now the military needs to have a special box of pens that don't have stipulations attached. With AI usage it would be the same thing except applied to entire product chains. It seems like it would just add more complexity to operations.

   You can agree with the rules anthropic wanted, but having rules set by a private company at all that apply to the military does seem fair for the military to object to.

   >The Department reasonably feared that Anthropic might manipulate Claude’s design to prevent it from performing national-security functions that the Department deems contractually authorized and necessary

   Though they'd probably put the DoD on the cybersecurity whitelist today, the very idea of the claude whitelists for certain functionality already exists and is being used by them today.

   1. sippingabonedry · 1790358153 · focus · HN ↗

      > I know everyone says this is political but it actually seems like a textbook designation

      It literally is a textbook definition, signed into US law:

      “Supply chain risk,” means the risk that an adversary may sabotage, maliciously introduce unwanted function, or otherwise subvert the design, integrity, manufacturing, production, distribution, installation, operation, or maintenance of a covered system so as to surveil, deny, disrupt, or otherwise degrade the function, use, or operation of such system (see 10 U.S.C. 3252).

      To add onto what another commenter said, the pen analogy would be more like the manufacturer designing pens that stopped working when used to sign strike orders they disagreed with.

      1. 7e · 1790361670 · focus · HN ↗

         It is not the textbook definition, because what Anthropic is doing is not sabotage, malicious, or subversive. Those are the key words in the definition. They are just refusing to add a feature to the military's specification. So their bid falls short of requirements.

         1. chrisjj · 1790365393 · focus · HN ↗

            > They are just refusing to add a feature to the military's specification.

            That fails to accord with the claim:

            >The Department reasonably feared that Anthropic might manipulate Claude’s design to prevent it from performing national-security functions that the Department deems contractually authorized and necessary

            1. cmdli · 1790366715 · focus · HN ↗

               That isn't sabotage, that is simply product design. Anthropic is free to create their products that refuse to kill people, and the DoD is free not to buy those products if they don't fit their needs.

               However, that's not what a supply chain risk is. It's not an order to "don't buy these products if they don't work the way we want them to", its designating Anthropic as a national security threat because they might intentionally sabotage US military operations.

               1. firesteelrain · 1790368187 · focus · HN ↗

                  > they might intentionally sabotage US military operations

                  Yes, this is why the DoW won’t use them.

                  1. gwerbin · 1790371462 · focus · HN ↗

                     As I said elsewhere, it's utterly preposterous that the DOD actually considers this a reasonable threat, because it's simply not a reasonable possibility. There's no way Anthropic would do that, precisely because of the consequences that would follow if they did, and got found out. Moreover, they already clearly stated their terms and preferences. It's all out of the open. There's no supply chain risk, that designation is purely political.

                     1. firesteelrain · 1790374024 · focus · HN ↗

                        > Moreover, they already clearly stated their terms and preferences.

                        No it isn’t see above

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