China banks buffer against AI contagions as US sweats over Anthropic’s Mythos
With Beijing prioritising financial stability, analysts say state lenders take a measured approach to generative models amid growing global cybersecurity risks
With US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell reported to have held urgent talks over Anthropic’s latest artificial intelligence model, experts are warning that immediate cybersecurity assessments are needed to avert potential economic damage running into the hundreds of billions of US dollars.
Across the Pacific, however, analysts said China’s banks were taking a more cautious approach, as Beijing prioritises financial stability and intensifies monitoring of any potential contagion from the US market.
“It is urgent that cybersecurity researchers everywhere evaluate what a model of this capability would do to the economy and critical infrastructure,” said Simon Goldstein, a philosophy professor at the University of Hong Kong who specialises in AI safety.
Bessent and Powell held a short-notice meeting on Tuesday with the heads of major US banks to address concerns surrounding Anthropic’s model, Mythos, ensuring that the banks were aware of the risks posed by Mythos and potential future models, and were taking precautions to defend their systems, according to a Bloomberg report on Thursday night, US time.