US Commerce Dept orders Anthropic to halt foreign AI model access, triggering 18-day global shutdown

Published Jul 23, 08:00 AM UTC

In June 2026, the U.S. Commerce Department ordered Anthropic to stop providing its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 AI models to foreign persons without a license, leading to a global shutdown of the models for 18 days. The order followed Amazon security researchers reportedly finding a way to jailbreak the models' guardrails. The article argues that the U.S. lacks a trusted, standardized process for evaluating frontier AI security risks and applying proportionate remedies. It proposes creating a statutory AI security review agency with emergency powers, anti-capture safeguards, and allied mutual recognition to replace the current opaque and unpredictable system of emergency export controls and closed-door pressure.