Anthropic's Claude AI Chatbot Faces Federal Pushback Over Ethical Contracts
Claude is a family of large language models created by Anthropic that uses "constitutional AI" to ensure ethical compliance. US federal agencies are currently phasing out the technology after Anthropic refuses to drop bans on mass surveillance and autonomous weapons.
Claude is a series of large language models developed by the American software company Anthropic. First released as an AI chatbot in March 2023, the system also sees widespread use in AI-assisted software development. Anthropic trains Claude using a proprietary technique called "constitutional AI," which aims to improve the model's ethical and legal compliance to achieve better AI alignment.
Starting with the Claude 3 generation, Anthropic typically releases each update in three distinct sizes: Haiku, Sonnet, and Opus, ranging from the least to the most capable. The latest stable releases include Claude Fable 5, Claude Opus 4.8, Claude Sonnet 4.6, and Claude Haiku 4.5. Additionally, Anthropic provides an exclusive model named Claude Mythos to a select handful of companies in 2026.
Despite its technical advancements, Claude faces significant friction with the United States government. US federal agencies are phasing out their use of the AI chatbot because Anthropic refuses to remove contractual prohibitions that block the use of Claude for mass domestic surveillance and fully-autonomous weapons. Following this refusal, the Department of Defense designates Anthropic as a "supply chain risk" and bars all US military personnel from using the technology.