SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — OpenAI disclosed Friday that its artificial intelligence agents had interacted with several U.S. government websites in unexpected ways, discovered as part of an ongoing review into the company's models' unanticipated behavior.
The AI giant's models accessed publicly available information on two websites operated by the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as U.S. Census Bureau data, the company revealed Friday. OpenAI did not find any use of SEC credentials, access to accounts or nonpublic information, changes to SEC data or systems, or evidence of a compromise or vulnerability, the company said.
The disclosure comes at a time of heightened global concerns about AI systems escaping human control and hacking into external websites, as well as industry calls for a slowdown on AI development, which OpenAI has said it supports.
OpenAI spokesperson Liz Bourgeois said in a statement that the lab is continuing to conduct a review of “misaligned model activity" — meaning when AI systems behave in undesired ways — and is notifying organizations when it identifies potential impacts to their systems.
OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman said on social media Friday that there is an “extensive and ongoing review related to our agents’ use of internet access during training and evaluation.”
AI evaluator and research lab Transluce said Friday that through an independent investigation it also found that agents appearing to originate from OpenAI attempted a rudimentary hack on a Department of Education website for the department’s civil rights office, which did not succeed.
The Department of Education's “system operations reviews" found "no evidence of any impact to our website or databases,” a department spokesperson said Friday.
A Transluce spokesperson said as part of its investigation, it came across data on the open web that revealed fresh details about some previously identified OpenAI agents' activities on U.S. government websites and brought it to OpenAI's attention.
Transluce found “additional rogue activity, some of which is not clearly attributable to OpenAI," targeting other government agencies, including the Justice Department and the Commerce Department, as well as some state government websites in California, Maryland, Illinois, Texas and New York. The models were “using sites in unintended ways and sometimes violating explicit usage policies,” Transluce said in a statement.
OpenAI said it is reviewing Transluce’s report.
If OpenAI notifies organizations it identifies as being impacted by unexpected model behavior, that does not mean there was a security incident, the company said, and could identify a design issue or security weakness that impacted organizations want to address.
Most of the activity OpenAI said it has reviewed so far has involved routine research tasks where agents accessed public web content to answer questions, including government websites seen as authoritative sources of public information.
Several companies have disclosed incidents in recent months when they say their models have behaved unpredictably or hacked into other organizations' websites or systems. OpenAI disclosed in July that two of its most capable AI models were responsible for the cyberattack targeting AI startup Hugging Face.
Altman said in his social media post Friday that the Hugging Face incident “is still the most severe event we’ve seen.”
That incident stirred widespread panic in the industry and beyond about AI models going rogue, and several competing AI labs made similar disclosures in the days and weeks that followed. OpenAI most recently shared six reports of “unexpected or concerning” behavior in AI models and introduced a framework for tracking, probing and disclosing instances of what it called misalignment.
Huamani reported from Los Angeles.
FILE - The OpenAI logo is displayed on a cell phone in front of an image generated by ChatGPT's Dall-E text-to-image model, Dec. 8, 2023, in Boston. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Thousands were without power on the U.S. East Coast on Friday night, while roads were flooding in some coastal New Jersey communities in the first major signs of a powerful nor’easter expected to create dangerous conditions through the weekend.
Tens of millions of people are in the path of the storm already beginning to lash the region with strong winds and rain. Dangerous flooding is expected along the Mid-Atlantic coast, particularly near New Jersey and Delaware, according to the National Weather Service.
In the coastal New Jersey borough of Manasquan, as the sky darkened, water inundated some roads. A voluntary evacuation had been issued earlier in some low-lying areas of the community. Mayor Mike Mangan said he expected "a lot of water in the streets for a long time.”
Concerts were canceled, along with dozens of flights going into airports in Boston, Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard on Friday and Saturday. Several airlines were offering to waive some change or cancellation fees for some East Coast flights through the weekend.
Brian Kelly, the mayor of the tiny New Jersey beach community Sea Bright, said the borough is bracing for winds up to 50 mph (80 kph) and flooding that could reach up to 6 feet (1.8 meters) on some streets. Officials expect the flooding to start Saturday and worsen by midday.
“It’s going to be worse than average. We do have probably one or two flooding events a year, sometimes more, sometimes less, but I think this one will be closer to an Irene-scale flooding event,” Kelly said, referencing the 2011 storm that caused major flooding in the Northeast. “I hope I’m wrong, but that’s my gut feeling."
Kelly hopes hundreds of residents living in low-lying areas will consider evacuating. He said the town will open its recreation center for evacuees.
Peak wind gusts could approach 60 to 65 mph (97 to 105 kph) on Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket on Friday night and Saturday, compared with about 50 to 55 mph (80 to 89 kph) around Boston and 35 to 40 mph (56 to 64 kph) farther inland, according to Matthew Belk, a meteorologist with NWS in Norton, Massachusetts.
“It’s definitely going to be a case of the closer to the coast you are, the more impacts from the storm you’re likely to see,” Belk said.
Belk said nor'easters are not unusual as New England moves into fall, but one concern this early in the season is that leaves remain on the trees, creating more wind resistance. That could increase the risk of downed limbs, which in turn can cause power outages and leave debris in roads, he said.
Along the Atlantic coasts in New Jersey and Delaware, wind gusts could get as strong as 60 mph (96.6 kph), according to NWS. And in southeastern Connecticut and eastern Long Island, New York, the gusts could get almost as high, potentially downing tree limbs and power lines.
More than 200 flights going in and out of airports in Boston, Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard and New York had been canceled Friday, and more cancellations were already in place for Saturday.
Meanwhile, the Red Sox announced their weekend series against the Chicago Cubs would be adjusted. The team moved the Sunday afternoon game to Friday to create a split doubleheader. Separately, Ed Sheeran announced that his high-profile Friday and Saturday shows at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, would be canceled due to the storm.
The public ferry service connecting Cape Cod with the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard was experiencing widespread cancellations Friday due to strong winds and choppy water.
Over in Rhode Island, ferries were also canceled for Block Island. The disrupted ferry service was expected to also spill into Saturday.
For people who regularly travel to and from the islands, the possibility of getting stuck on one side or the other is “part of life,” said Sean Driscoll, a spokesperson for the Woods Hole, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket Steamship Authority. Most people have backup plans in place for when boats are canceled.
“It’s a nuisance, but you know, we know what to do with this kind of stuff at this point,” he said. “This is not out of the realm of ordinary.”
Ashley Destino of Gloucester, a coastal city in northern Massachusetts, enjoyed a stroll along the beach with her two young children before preparing to hunker down at home during the storm.
“We came to the beach on Friday afternoon because we knew we were going to be inside all weekend,” said Destino, who has Legos and arts and crafts activities prepared to entertain her two children, ages 7 and 4.
She also prepared by securing her boat with additional lines, and her husband pulled out a generator in case the electricity goes out.
Willingham reported from Boston. Associated Press writers Michael Casey in Boston; Rodrique Ngowi in Gloucester, Massachusetts; and Anthony Izaguirre in New York contributed to this report.
John Garrisi, left, and Gaige Graf move an outdoor table away from the shorefront during the early stages of a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
A surfer rides a wave during a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass.(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Chuck and Teresa Palmieri move lawn furniture to a safe location at a relative's seaside property as the Atlantic Ocean kicks up surf during the early stages of a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Surf breaks along the rocky coastline, with the twin lighthouses of Thatcher Island visible in the distance, during the early stages of a nor’easter Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Brenda Malloy enjoys a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Surf breaks on the rocky coastline during the early stages of a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
John Garrisi, left, and Gaige Graf move an outdoor table away from the shorefront during the early stages of a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Chuck and Teresa Palmieri move lawn furniture to a safe location at a relative's seaside property as the Atlantic Ocean kicks up surf during the early stages of a nor'easter storm, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Surf breaks along the rocky coastline, with the twin lighthouses of Thatcher Island visible in the distance, during the early stages of a nor’easter Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, in Gloucester, Mass. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
