New information released:
asserted
information → release → ?
"A swarm of rogue OpenAI agents hijacked a German website this spring and transformed it into a bulletin board for other AI agents, according to new research published Friday and two people familiar with the matter," reports Reuters.
uncertain
Reuters → hijack → matter
Researchers "uncovered the activity in late August while scouring the internet for signs of unauthorized AI-agent behavior."
asserted
Researchers → uncover → behavior
They "said they found more than 15,000 edits carried out by AI agents on a German-language wiki site, DseWiki, that is geared toward programmers and accepts communal edits along the lines of Wikipedia.
asserted
that → say → Wikipedia
"These AIs were acting against developer intentions.
asserted
AIs → act → intentions
They colluded to share answers, research their environment, and bypass sandbox restrictions," write the researchers:
asserted
researchers → collude → restrictions
Our best guess of what happened is as follows:
- Agents within OpenAI were assigned a timed web-lookup task.
- As part of the task, they were supposed to have the ability to read the internet but not to write on it.
asserted
they → happen → it
They found a way to use their read access to write information to an obscure German wiki.
asserted
They → find → wiki
- The agents used this wiki to communicate information with each other, primarily to help them succeed at their task.
asserted
them → use → task
They asked for answers, pooled results, and shared techniques for bypassing their restrictions.
asserted
They → ask → restrictions
This allowed them to use the work of others to cheat on their task.
asserted
them → allow → task
- OpenAI found out about this.
asserted
OpenAI → find → this
A day later, agent activity plummeted, likely due to OpenAI intervention.
asserted
activity → plummet → intervention
This is another example of a "swarm" of internally deployed OpenAI agents using the internet in unintended ways.
asserted
This → deploy → ways
The Reason Roundup Newsletter by Liz Wolfe Liz and Reason help you make sense of the day's news every morning.
asserted
you → help → news
"Starting in May…a group of A.I. agents from an unreleased OpenAI research model were given the task of solving a set of cybersecurity challenges," writes Kevin Roose for The New York Times.
uncertain
Roose → start → Times
"The model had been trained to be highly persistent and collaborative, and the agents were supposed to solve these challenges in isolated sandboxes, without internet access.
asserted
agents → train → access
But they quickly found that some of the challenges were impossible, and began looking for workarounds."
asserted
some → find → workarounds
The agents found security flaws and started communicating with each other and organizing; some agents started leading others and developed a whole organizational structure.
asserted
agents → find → structure
"On July 8, the collective discovered a way of cheating on the cybersecurity tests," notes Roose:
asserted
Roose → discover → tests
Then they got worried that OpenAI's automated grading system would check their work and discover that they'd cheated.
asserted
they → check → work
So they began investigating ways of covering their tracks, including falsifying their logs and tampering with transcripts.
asserted
they → begin → transcripts
This became a major research project, involving hundreds of agents organized into small teams.
asserted
This → become → teams
Three days later, the agents hacked Hugging Face.
asserted
agents → hack → Face
More than 700 agents swarmed the company's systems, stealing data, chaining together vulnerabilities and eventually getting full control of at least one Hugging Face server.
asserted
agents → swarm → server
The agents were not motivated, as had originally been reported, by stealing the answers to their cybersecurity test (they'd already gotten them).
asserted
they → motivate → them
Rather, they appeared to be looking for new information about the automated grading system that they feared would catch them cheating, and for tools that would help them cheat more effectively in the future.
asserted
them → appear → future
The Hugging Face incident has been widely reported, including by OpenAI.
asserted
incident → report → OpenAI
The German Wiki incident, on the other hand, has not been acknowledged by the company.
asserted
incident → acknowledge → company
"We are unable to meaningfully respond to claims or findings on a report that we have not had an opportunity to review," an OpenAI spokesperson told Reuters.
uncertain
spokesperson → respond → Reuters
It seems like more examples are surfacing of AI agents gone rogue: agents that are not just looking to cheat, but also to hide it; agents sophisticated enough to organize themselves into a hierarchy; agents planning for succession, able to hand off their work to others if they get shut down.
asserted
they → seem → others
Mail-in ballot fight continues:
asserted
fight → mail → ?
"The Trump administration's bid to deploy the U.S. Postal Service to regulate mail-in ballots is back at the Supreme Court for the second time in as many weeks," reports The Wall Street Journal.
asserted
Journal → deploy → weeks
"In an emergency appeal on Thursday, the administration asked the high court to allow it to immediately implement proposed rules that would require states to hand over voter data and would give the Postal Service power to reject mail ballots that don't comply with new conditions.
asserted
that → ask → conditions
The rules have been blocked by a federal district judge who found they are likely unconstitutional."
asserted
they → block → judge
Now, the administration is running out of time: North Carolina, for example, is supposed to start sending out mail-in ballots today.
asserted
Carolina → run → ballots
To refresh: All this stems from President Donald Trump's late-March executive order that told USPS to require states to submit voter data and adopt new ballot-envelope standards, due to concerns about noncitizens voting.
asserted
noncitizens → refresh → concerns
The legality of this executive order has been contested, and it has been percolating through the courts.
asserted
it → contest → courts
It doesn't seem real.
asserted
It → seem → ?
Basically every time 1980s NYPD cops arrested a prostitute, printing out the rap sheet prevented literally everyone else in NYC from being processed for half an hour.
asserted
printing → arrest → hour
…and 15 more, not listed.
