Fable5被迫下線前24小時，白宮發生了什麼事？

Original Title: Inside the whirlwind 24 hours that led the White House to slap export controls on Anthropic

Original Authors: Sophia Cai and Cheyenne Haslett, Politico

Original Translation Compilation: Peggy

Editor's Note: The Fable 5 model, released just days ago by Anthropic, was suddenly taken offline. The trigger was the Trump administration citing national security concerns, demanding restrictions on foreign nationals' access to two advanced AI models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, from Anthropic. Due to the difficulty of precisely distinguishing user identities and access permissions, Anthropic ultimately chose to disable the relevant models for all customers.

Behind this abrupt takedown was a high-pressure 24-hour standoff between the White House and Anthropic. Centered on whether Fable 5's safety guardrails could be bypassed, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei engaged in multiple tense phone calls with senior government officials, including the Treasury Secretary, Commerce Secretary, and the White House Cyber Director. The government believed the model could be used to identify software vulnerabilities, posing a national security risk; Anthropic, however, emphasized that the issue was not a "universal jailbreak" and criticized the government's actions for lacking a transparent, clear, and technically-grounded legal process.

The core of this incident is not merely a model takedown, nor just a breakdown in communication between the White House and an AI company. Rather, it signifies that advanced AI models are being redefined as a potential national security asset. When model capabilities enter sensitive domains like cybersecurity, vulnerability discovery, and intelligence analysis, the government is no longer satisfied with corporate self-assessments and voluntary reviews. It is beginning to employ stronger policy tools, such as export controls, to directly intervene in the pace of model releases.

Ironically, Anthropic has been one of the most vocal advocates for regulation within the AI industry, yet it has now become the target of the regulatory hammer. The government believes its response to security vulnerabilities was insufficiently serious, while Anthropic deems the White House's reaction an overreach. At the heart of this dispute lies a new question the AI industry must confront: Who has the authority to judge whether a model is safe enough? Is corporate self-certification of safety still sufficient? And how will swift interventions under the guise of national security reshape the compliance costs, release cadence, and global competitive landscape of AI companies?

The Anthropic incident could become a watershed moment for advanced AI regulation. In the future, releasing the most cutting-edge models will no longer be just a product launch; it will be more akin to a high-stakes deployment involving national security, geopolitics, capital markets, and industry order.

Below is the original text:

Before the Trump administration imposed sweeping export controls on Anthropic, senior White House officials engaged in an urgent 24-hour mediation effort, attempting to persuade the AI company to voluntarily take down a newly released model. Multiple government officials believed the model could pose a national security risk.

According to two government officials and one senior White House official, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei made several tense phone calls with senior government figures during this turmoil, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and White House Cyber Director Sean Cairncross. The individuals spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

This event also brings an increasingly pressing issue to the forefront: How should the White House draw the line between innovation and security when faced with advanced AI models that evolve rapidly and have expanding capabilities?

These details of the phone calls have not been previously reported.

The Night Before the Model Takedown: Safety Controversy

After the government implemented export controls, Anthropic was forced to take down its new model, Fable, which had only been publicly available for a few days. Anthropic had previously assured the public that the model was safe and controllable, but shortly after its release, senior government officials began re-evaluating whether its safety guardrails were as robust as the company claimed.

Two government officials and a senior White House official said that on Thursday, two days after Fable's public launch, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy expressed concerns to the White House that the model's safety guardrails could be at risk of being bypassed.

A person familiar with Amazon's communications said the company was responding to a government request for feedback on potential risks.

By Friday morning, the issue had escalated to the highest levels of the White House.

According to the government officials and the senior White House official, Bessent, Cairncross, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, and other senior officials convened a meeting to discuss the model and the government's response. One of the sources said Bessent, who was traveling to Houston for a scheduled public event, participated remotely.

After the meeting, the government tried to contact Amodei but was told he was temporarily unavailable to take calls due to attending a health retreat, as one government official and the senior White House official stated.

An Anthropic spokesperson denied this claim, stating: "That is completely untrue."

A person close to Anthropic, however, said the government first requested to contact Amodei around noon, and Amodei was on the phone with senior officials within 1 hour and 15 minutes. This person said that during the time Amodei was temporarily unavailable, Anthropic offered to have other executives communicate on his behalf.

Once the government finally reached Amodei, he participated in three phone calls. The senior White House official and one government official said about half a dozen senior government figures were on the calls, including Cairncross, Bessent, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

The senior White House official added that other White House staff and government officials, including Commerce Under Secretary for Industry and Security Jeffrey Kessler, White House Cabinet Secretary Will Scharf, Deputy Chief of Staff Richard Walters, and Presidential Policy Advisor Walker Barrett, also participated in some of the calls.

During the calls, Amodei tried to clarify what he believed were misunderstandings. He countered the government's safety concerns, defended Anthropic's safeguards, and emphasized that the discovered bypass method was specific to a certain scenario and did not constitute a broader "jailbreak" – one that would fully free the model from Anthropic's safety guardrails.

In a blog post published after the export controls were implemented, Anthropic stated: "To date, no tester has found a universal jailbreak method – i.e., a jailbreak that would broadly bypass a model’s safety measures and unlock a vast range of cyber capabilities." The company also said that completely eliminating all jailbreak attempts is currently unrealistic for Anthropic or any other AI company.

Anthropic also defended its safety system, stating its guardrails are "so strong that many users complain they are too broad."

However, Cairncross and Bessent were not convinced by Amodei's explanations. A White House official said Amazon's findings had been submitted for review by the National Security Agency, which considered the material sufficient to constitute "evidence."

According to the senior White House official and the two government officials, the government urged Anthropic to voluntarily take down the model and coordinate with the government to fix the vulnerabilities. Amodei asked for more time and information but did not commit to taking down the model. The senior White House official stated that during one of the calls, Bessent directly told Amodei he was making a "bad decision."

The Regulatory Hammer Falls: Fable 5 and Mythos 5 Facing Controls

Shortly after the calls concluded, the Trump administration imposed export controls on the Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models. Anthropic stated that the government invoked national security authority to prohibit foreign nationals from using these models. The company said the "practical effect" of the order was that, to ensure compliance, Anthropic had to "suddenly disable" all customer access to the relevant models.

A senior White House official stated: "We begged them to work with us for several hours. Export controls were the last resort. This is not something we wanted to do, but we had no other option."

Following the report, a person close to Anthropic refuted this, claiming the company was not given a choice of "voluntary cooperation."

This person said: "The White House gave only 90 minutes to take down the model, without providing any details about the actual threat. There was never any begging or asking for cooperation, just an announced 90-minute deadline."

A senior White House official said that White House officials had heard Amodei compare the danger of Anthropic's technology to a nuclear bomb. Therefore, they found it difficult to understand why the CEO, who had long advocated for AI safety regulation, was unwilling to take down the system to fix a known security vulnerability.

Anthropic has long been seen as one of the most vocal advocates for regulation within the AI industry. The company has repeatedly argued for a regulatory framework to address the potential global safety risks and job displacement stemming from the rapid development of AI.

Three people familiar with the government's thinking said that Amazon was not the only company to raise concerns with the government.

One of them said: "The core issue is that Anthropic didn't treat this seriously enough. If Anthropic had taken it seriously, instead of downplaying it as an isolated incident, and proactively fixed it or suspended access, this never would have reached this point."

Another person close to Anthropic countered that the so-called "jailbreak" did not mean Fable 5's safety system failed, and noted that the company had communicated with the government before releasing Fable. This person claimed that in multiple interactions, the government did not object to the Fable release.

After the government imposed export controls, Anthropic stated in a blog post that it would comply with the government's directive but simultaneously believed the move was an overreaction.

Anthropic stated: "As we have said publicly, we believe the government should have the authority to prevent unsafe deployments, but this should be based on a transparent, fair, and clear legal process grounded in technical facts. This action does not meet those principles."

A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said innovation remains the White House's "primary goal, but we must also prioritize safety."

Amazon declined to disclose specific details of its communications with the government in a statement. An Amazon spokesperson said: "It is not uncommon for the government to seek our views on potential security risks. When such situations occur, we do not disclose details of those discussions."

In early April of this year, Anthropic announced that its latest powerful model, Mythos, would only be made available to a few technology and cybersecurity companies to help them test software vulnerabilities. Anthropic stated at the time that due to the model's immense power, it could cause serious consequences if it fell into the wrong hands, thus necessitating tight restrictions on its release.

The launch of Mythos prompted a series of meetings between Amodei and senior White House officials. Both sides described these meetings as productive. Subsequently, multiple rounds of discussions took place regarding how to regulate advanced AI models, ultimately leading to a recent executive order requiring companies to voluntarily submit advanced models for government review before widespread deployment.

Fable 5, publicly released this week, was described by Anthropic as a "Mythos-level model" but equipped with additional safety measures, allowing it to be opened to general users. The model was reviewed by the US government and the UK AI Safety Institute.

However, after the so-called safety flaw was disclosed, multiple government officials believed the model needed to be taken down immediately.

On Saturday morning, former White House AI director and staunch regulation opponent David Sacks posted on X, supporting the government's imposition of export controls on Anthropic.

Sacks stated he did not believe the "jailbreak" was simple or insignificant, nor did he think the export controls were an attempt by the government to broadly control the AI industry. Sacks wrote: "The government now wants Anthropic to fix the safety issue, then lift the export controls and return Fable to public release. The government wants this to happen as quickly as possible. Frankly, the government is puzzled that Anthropic, which previously said safety requests were its highest priority, is now unwilling to cooperate."

Sacks and other officials within the government have previously criticized Anthropic multiple times, accusing it of left-wing political bias and of creating panic by advocating for stronger industry regulation and warning of massive job displacement.

Earlier this year, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the Pentagon escalated the friction between the government and Anthropic to an unprecedented level. On March 3rd, because Anthropic refused to allow its AI tools to be used for mass domestic surveillance and autonomous weapons systems, the Pentagon designated the company as a supply chain risk.

On Saturday, Sacks stated that the pre-existing dispute between the government and Anthropic was separate from the export control decision. Sacks wrote: "The government values Anthropic's technical capabilities and believes this issue, while serious, should be easily resolvable. The ball is now in Anthropic's court."

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