OpenAI said it has struck a deal for the Pentagon to use its models in the US defence agency's classified network with "safeguards," after President Donald Trump blacklisted AI rival Anthropic.

The Trump had ordered the government to stop using Anthropic, calling it a threat to national security after it refused to agree to unconditional military use of its Claude models.

The firm vowed to sue over the "intimidation" in what has become a rare public dispute between a major tech firm and the US government, insisting its technology should not be used for mass surveillance or fully autonomous weapons systems.

Hours later, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced a deal with the Pentagon to use its models with similar red lines to Anthropic, using "technical safeguards" that the Department of Defence had agreed to.

"Two of our most important safety principles are prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems," Altman wrote on X, adding that those principles went "into our agreement".

Washington had lashed out at Anthropic over its ethical concerns, saying the Pentagon operated within the law and contracted suppliers could not set terms on how their products were employed.

"I am directing EVERY Federal Agency in the United States Government to IMMEDIATELY CEASE all use of Anthropic's technology. We don't need it, we don't want it, and will not do business with them again!" Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform.

"Anthropic better get their act together, and be helpful during this phase out period, or I will use the Full Power of the Presidency to make them comply, with major civil and criminal consequences to follow," Trump added.

Anthropic said no pushback from Washington would "change our position on mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons".

The Pentagon has threatened to designate Anthropic a supply chain risk – a label typically reserved for companies from adversary nations.

In response Anthropic said it would seek to overturn the ban. "We will challenge any supply chain risk designation in court," the San Francisco-based AI startup said in a lengthy statement that outlined the dangers of the Pentagon's demands.

US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said earlier he was directing the Pentagon to follow through on the latter threat, and that "effective immediately, no contractor, supplier, or partner that does business with the United States military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic."

The conflict had earlier drawn a show of solidarity from others in the industry, with hundreds of employees from AI giants Google DeepMind and OpenAI urging their companies to rally behind Anthropic in an open letter titled "We Will Not Be Divided."

"We hope our leaders will put aside their differences and stand together to continue to refuse the Department of War's current demands for permission to use our models for domestic mass surveillance and autonomously killing people without human oversight," the letter said. (AFP)



Edited by Thomas McAlinden