Something feels off about this announcement. Anyone else?
Credit where it's due, going on record like this isn't easy, particularly when facing pressure from a major government client. Still, the two limits Anthropic is defending deserve a closer look.
On surveillance: the carve-out only protects people inside the US. Speaking as someone based in Europe, that's a detail that doesn't go unnoticed. On autonomous weapons: realistically, current AI systems aren't anywhere near capable enough to run one independently. So that particular line in the sand isn't really costing them much.
What I find more candid is actually the revised RSP. It draws a clearer picture of where Anthropic's oversight genuinely holds and where it starts to break down as they race to stay at the cutting edge. The core tension, trying to be simultaneously the most powerful and the most principled player in the room, doesn't have a neat resolution.
This statement doesn't offer one either. But engaging with the question openly, even without all the answers, beats silence and gives the rest of us something real to push back on.
>the carve-out only protects people inside the US. Speaking as someone based in Europe, that's a detail that doesn't go unnoticed.
I'm not sure an American company prioritising the privacy of American people is worth questioning. As a European, Anthropic are very low on the list of companies I worry about in terms of the progressive eradication of my privacy.
Agreed. That said, Anthropic's original pitch was about embedding safety at the foundational level of the 'model' (acknowledging that a model is more than just its weights).
If the safeguard against mass surveillance is strictly tied to geolocation (US vs. non-US), it can't be an intrinsic property of the model. It has to be enforced at the API or contractual level. This means international users are left out of those core, embedded protections. Unless Anthropic is planning to deploy multiple, differently-aligned foundation models based on customer geography or industry, the safety harness isn't really in the model anymore.
They surveil us to make sure that we stay productive and democratic, why do you object? Are you alleging bad intentions? Are you a Russian bot?