I spent two years at the Federal Trade Commission, watching regulators doing their best to keep pace with Silicon Valley. I thought I had seen the outer limits of how Big Tech’s command over government policy could be; I did not think it could get worse. I was wrong.
Last month, Anthropic refused to allow the Defense Department to use Claude, the company’s popular flagship family of AI assistants, for domestic mass surveillance and lethal autonomous warfare. In response, the government canceled its $200 million contract with Anthropic. According to the Department, the company’s constraints would undercut its ability to defend the country from real threats.
