A pair of U.S. senators wants to know how the government is tracking and responding to hackers’ use of AI platforms to conduct cyberattacks.
“The emerging threat to U.S. cybersecurity posed by foreign adversaries deploying autonomous AI systems requires a robust response from your office and other federal agencies,” Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., and Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, wrote in a Tuesday letter to National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross.
The bipartisan letter comes several weeks after Anthropic revealed that Chinese government-linked hackers had manipulated the company’s Claude platform into breaching companies and government agencies around the world. The attack, which Anthropic called “the first documented case of a large-scale cyberattack executed without substantial human intervention,” has exacerbated worries within the security community about the growing offensive capabilities of AI tools.
Hassan and Ernst asked Cairncross about his office’s communication with Anthropic about the attack, the response from other government agencies, whether the China-linked group had targeted the U.S. (and, if so, whether any of those attacks were successful) and whether the White House knew of other similar incidents.
The senators also asked Cairncross, who took over the Office of the National Cyber Director (ONCD) in August, about his plans to work with AI companies to limit the technology’s potential use in cyberattacks.
ONCD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
AI hacking fears captivate Congress
Even as many U.S. lawmakers champion the transformative potential of AI, Hassan and Ernst’s letter points to growing concern on Capitol Hill about the technology’s serious harms.
In the Senate, Hassan is a senior member of the Homeland Security Committee, while Ernst sits on the Armed Services Committee and its cyber subcommittee.
“Given your office’s role in countering cyberattacks against the U.S. government,” the lawmakers wrote to Cairncross, “we urge you to continue coordinating with Congress and other federal agencies to address this emerging national security threat.”
Despite the occasional bipartisan congressional anxiety, however, it remains unclear how cybersecurity fits into the White House’s AI strategy. The Trump administration has focused much more on the benefits of AI than on its risks, both cybersecurity and otherwise. The White House’s AI Action Plan says little about cybersecurity, although it does direct agencies to help critical infrastructure organizations track and counter AI-related security threats.
