OpenAI Grants Ukraine Access to Daybreak AI Cyber Defense System Against Russian Cyberattacks

OpenAI announced it will provide Ukraine's government with free access to its Daybreak AI cyber defense system, marking a significant expansion of Western tech support in the ongoing conflict. The announcement came Wednesday on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, delivered jointly by Sasha Baker, OpenAI's Head of National Security Policy, and Dmytro Kushneruk, Ukraine's Consul General in San Francisco.1

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Ukraine Faces Relentless Digital Assault

The urgency behind this partnership becomes clear when examining the scale of Russian cyberattacks targeting Ukraine. According to CERT-UA, Ukraine's national cyber incident response team, the country recorded nearly 6,000 cyberattacks in 2025 alone.2

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These attacks have systematically targeted civilian infrastructure including hospital systems, the energy sector, telecommunications networks, and water treatment facilities. "Ukraine is already on the front line, and its defenders need support now," Baker emphasized. "We want to put more capable tools in their hands to help them find and fix vulnerabilities and protect the critical networks people depend on."3

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What Daybreak Brings to Ukraine's Digital Defenses

Under the agreement with Ukraine's Ministry of Digital Transformation, Ukrainian cyber defenders will gain access to OpenAI's advanced GPT-5.6 Sol model, a rival to Anthropic's Mythos and Fable systems.2

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Daybreak runs on this flagship large language model and is designed to hunt down software vulnerabilities before hostile actors can exploit them. The system can proactively identify potential exploits in digital systems, review aging software, investigate suspicious activity, validate vulnerabilities, and test fixes before deployment.4

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George Osborne, former UK chancellor and now Head of OpenAI for Countries, stated: "Protecting civilian infrastructure means defending it against both physical and digital attacks, so people can continue to live, work and access essential services."2

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The AI cyber defence tools should help ensure Ukrainian civilians maintain access to clean water, electricity, and heating through the winter months despite ongoing Russian attempts to compromise these critical systems.1

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Proven Track Record Across Europe

Ukraine isn't the first to benefit from Daybreak's capabilities. OpenAI reported that defenders in France, Germany, Poland and other European countries already use its cyber models.3

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The EU's cyber agency, ENISA, used them to identify vulnerabilities in software deployed across EU institutions, with all discovered flaws since fixed. In Poland, CERT Polska leveraged OpenAI models to uncover six vulnerabilities in third-party router software, with the vendor subsequently releasing patches that successfully prevent the attacks CERT Polska had observed.3

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The Dual-Use Nature of AI in Cyber Warfare

The deployment highlights the dual-use nature of AI in modern conflict. While Daybreak helps defenders identify vulnerabilities to block hackers, the same capabilities could theoretically assist attackers hunting for system weaknesses.2

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Russia has actively deployed AI to enhance its war effort and cyber capabilities. Anthropic claimed earlier this month it thwarted a Russian attempt to use its Claude AI model to develop drone swarm designs for kamikaze drones.1

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OpenAI also disrupted a network of accounts linked to Russian disinformation projects.

Strategic Implications and Industry Perspectives

Rafe Pilling, senior director of threat intelligence for Sophos, noted that Russian offensive cyber operations had been "a key component" of the Kremlin's aggression against Ukraine since 2014. "Any initiative that strengthens Ukraine's already highly capable, but heavily burdened, cyber defence efforts is a welcome development and could provide a valuable force multiplier," he said.2

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Jamie MacColl, a senior research fellow specializing in cybersecurity at the Royal United Services Institute, told the BBC that Western tech firms support Ukraine partly for altruistic reasons but also gain valuable data and intelligence from an active conflict. He expected access to Daybreak would prove useful given the volume of Russian cyberattacks, though he noted Ukraine already had access to AI tools from OpenAI's competitors, including Google.2

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Broader Context of AI in Modern Warfare

The announcement aligns with OpenAI's September 3 pledge of $1 billion in subsidized Daybreak access to resource-strapped defenders worldwide, with expansion to partner countries promised within weeks.4

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This represents a significant shift for OpenAI, which until January 2024 maintained usage policies that flatly banned military and warfare activity. That restriction quietly disappeared on January 10, 2024, days before CEO Sam Altman revealed the company was building cybersecurity tools with the Pentagon.4

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AI in cyber warfare extends beyond digital defenses. Long-range kamikaze drones operating deep in enemy territory face significant electronic warfare interference, disrupting communication between drones and operators. While fiber-optic cables have proved effective counters, AI has been deployed for terminal guidance, allowing human operators to fly drones within target range before AI takes over if connections are interrupted.1

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For Ukraine, every vulnerability Daybreak identifies before Russian hackers discover it represents critical time gained in protecting power plants, hospitals, and the essential services millions depend on daily.