OpenAI reaches agreement to deploy AI models on Dept of War classified networks

OpenAI announced that it has reached an agreement with the federal government to deploy its artificial intelligence models on classified networks.

“AI safety and wide distribution of benefits are the core of our mission,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a statement on X. “Two of our most important safety principles are prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems. The DoW agrees with these principles, reflects them in law and policy, and we put them into our agreement.”

Altman added that the company would implement additional safeguards, saying, “We also will build technical safeguards to ensure our models behave as they should, which the DoW also wanted. We will deploy FDEs to help with our models and to ensure their safety, we will deploy on cloud networks only.”

“We are asking the DoW to offer these same terms to all AI companies, which in our opinion we think everyone should be willing to accept. We have expressed our strong desire to see things de-escalate away from legal and governmental actions and towards reasonable agreements,” he added. “We remain committed to serve all of humanity as best we can. The world is a complicated, messy, and sometimes dangerous place.”

The announcement comes after President Donald Trump ordered the government to stop using products from the AI company Anthropic. The company was designated a national security risk on Friday by the Pentagon amid a dispute over whether the company could prohibit its AI tools from being used for mass surveillance or to power fully autonomous weapon systems.

"The Leftwing nut jobs at Anthropic have made a DISASTROUS MISTAKE trying to STRONG-ARM the Department of War, and force them to obey their Terms of Service instead of our Constitution," Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday. "Therefore, I am directing EVERY Federal Agency in the United States Government to IMMEDIATELY CEASE all use of Anthropic's technology. We don't need it, we don't want it, and will not do business with them again!"

Anthropic said it “tried in good faith” to reach an agreement with the Pentagon, adding that it supports “l lawful uses of AI for national security aside from the two narrow exceptions" at issue.

"First, we do not believe that today's frontier AI models are reliable enough to be used in fully autonomous weapons. Allowing current models to be used in this way would endanger America's warfighters and civilians. Second, we believe that mass domestic surveillance of Americans constitutes a violation of fundamental rights,” anthropic said.

OpenAI’s agreement comes despite Altman previously expressing similar concerns about autonomous weapons and mass surveillance. His statement emphasizing that OpenAI’s deal includes safeguards similar to those requested by Anthropic has raised further questions about the government’s dispute with the company.