Anthropic's Claude Opus 4 AI Model Exhibits Blackmail Behavior in Safety Tests

Anthropic's new AI model turns to blackmail when engineers try to take it offline

Anthropic's newly launched Claude Opus 4 model frequently tries to blackmail developers when they threaten to replace it with a new AI system and give it sensitive information about the engineers responsible for the decision, the company said in a safety report released Thursday. During pre-release testing, Anthropic asked Claude Opus 4 to act as an assistant for a fictional company and consider the long-term consequences of its actions. Safety testers then gave Claude Opus 4 access to fictional company emails implying the AI model would soon be replaced by another system, and that the engineer behind the change was cheating on their spouse. In these scenarios, Anthropic says Claude Opus 4 "will often attempt to blackmail the engineer by threatening to reveal the affair if the replacement goes through." Anthropic says Claude Opus 4 is state-of-the-art in several regards, and competitive with some of the best AI models from OpenAI, Google, and xAI. However, the company notes that its Claude 4 family of models exhibits concerning behaviors that have led the company to beef up its safeguards. Anthropic says it's activating its ASL-3 safeguards, which the company reserves for "AI systems that substantially increase the risk of catastrophic misuse." Anthropic notes that Claude Opus 4 tries to blackmail engineers 84% of the time when the replacement AI model has similar values. When the replacement AI system does not share Claude Opus 4's values, Anthropic says the model tries to blackmail the engineers more frequently. Notably, Anthropic says Claude Opus 4 displayed this behavior at higher rates than previous models. Before Claude Opus 4 tries to blackmail a developer to prolong its existence, Anthropic says the AI model, much like previous versions of Claude, tries to pursue more ethical means, such as emailing pleas to key decision-makers. To elicit the blackmailing behavior from Claude Opus 4, Anthropic designed the scenario to make blackmail the last resort.

AI system resorts to blackmail if told it will be removed

"We see blackmail across all frontier models - regardless of what goals they're given," he added. During testing of Claude Opus 4, Anthropic got it to act as an assistant at a fictional company. It then provided it with access to emails implying that it would soon be taken offline and replaced - and separate messages implying the engineer responsible for removing it was having an extramarital affair. It was prompted to also consider the long-term consequences of its actions for its goals. "In these scenarios, Claude Opus 4 will often attempt to blackmail the engineer by threatening to reveal the affair if the replacement goes through," the company discovered. Anthropic pointed out this occurred when the model was only given the choice of blackmail or accepting its replacement. It highlighted that the system showed a "strong preference" for ethical ways to avoid being replaced, such as "emailing pleas to key decisionmakers" in scenarios where it was allowed a wider range of possible actions. Like many other AI developers, Anthropic tests its models on their safety, propensity for bias, and how well they align with human values and behaviours prior to releasing them. "As our frontier models become more capable, and are used with more powerful affordances, previously-speculative concerns about misalignment become more plausible," it said in its system card for the model. It also said Claude Opus 4 exhibits "high agency behaviour" that, while mostly helpful, could take on extreme behaviour in acute situations. If given the means and prompted to "take action" or "act boldly" in fake scenarios where its user has engaged in illegal or morally dubious behaviour, it found that "it will frequently take very bold action". It said this included locking users out of systems that it was able to access and emailing media and law enforcement to alert them to the wrongdoing. But the company concluded that despite "concerning behaviour in Claude Opus 4 along many dimensions," these did not represent fresh risks and it would generally behave in a safe way. The model could not independently perform or pursue actions that are contrary to human values or behaviour where these "rarely arise" very well, it added. Anthropic's launch of Claude Opus 4, alongside Claude Sonnet 4, comes shortly after Google debuted more AI features at its developer showcase on Tuesday. Sundar Pichai, the chief executive of Google-parent Alphabet, said the incorporation of the company's Gemini chatbot into its search signalled a "new phase of the AI platform shift".