By David Shepardson and Chris Thomas
WASHINGTON, June 26 (Reuters) - The U.S. government on Friday allowed Anthropic to release its powerful Claude Mythos 5 AI model to some "trusted partners," according to a Commerce Department letter seen by Reuters.
The action comes two weeks after the government ordered the AI firm to suspend access to some of its models, due to fears they could be deployed by military intelligence users in China, Russia or other countries of concern.
More than 100 companies and
institutions will now have access to Mythos 5, including many Fortune 500 companies, a source familiar with the new directive said, declining to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Anthropic and the White House did not immediately comment.
Anthropic had abruptly disabled its most advanced AI models — Mythos 5 and Fable 5 — for all users after the government's export control order.
"Since the issuance of my June 12 letter, Anthropic has worked with the U.S. government to address risks associated with the Covered Models. These efforts have yielded significant progress," U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said in the letter to Anthropic.
Lutnick added that an export license will no longer be needed for Claude Mythos 5 Model to trusted companies and their foreign national employees, or to Anthropic’s foreign national employees but restrictions will remain in place for companies that are not on the approved list.
"In just two weeks, we have worked diligently to ensure America remains the global leader in AI while safeguarding our security," a Commerce Department spokesperson said.
The letter did not mention the status of Fable 5.
The government is moving towards allowing Anthropic to release Fable as well, although a timeline is unclear, the source said.
IPO-bound Anthropic's relationship with the U.S. government has been rocky this year. The company refused to allow the U.S. military to use its AI models for domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons systems and the government retaliated by putting it on a national security blacklist.
(Reporting by Mrinmay Dey and Chris Thomas in Mexico City, David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by Anil D'Silva and Edwina Gibbs)
