OpenAI confirms weeks of AI safety talks with Anthropic and Google DeepMind
OpenAI policy chief Chris Lehane revealed the three rivals have coordinated on frontier AI safety for weeks, raising antitrust questions Congress is now weighing.
Summary
TechCrunch reports that on Tuesday Chris Lehane, who leads global policy at OpenAI, told reporters the company has spent weeks collaborating with competitors Anthropic and Google DeepMind on safety, as Bloomberg first reported. Lehane is said to be in Washington working with lawmakers on catastrophic AI risks. The disclosure follows an essay by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, published Saturday, urging the industry to cooperate on slowing frontier AI to avoid catastrophic risks. Sam Altman, Demis Hassabis and Elon Musk backed the call, and Altman said OpenAI would join Anthropic in placing third-party evaluators inside the company to monitor safety.
The article notes that Altman and others have flagged antitrust exposure if such coordination were judged to dampen competition. Amodei's essay floated a narrow government waiver for safety cooperation, but Lehane reportedly said the firms do not need one. Separately, The Information reported this week that all three firms are building an industry standards body, which Altman reportedly told staff must proceed without US government support. Hassabis had urged the US in July to create a standards body acting as an AI watchdog, able to screen advanced models and coordinate industry-wide slowdowns if dangers grew.
On the political side, President Trump has called safety concerns a hoax and argued a slowdown would help China, and adviser David Sacks has played down existential-risk fears. At the same Tuesday meeting, Lehane added that OpenAI backs a FRONTIER Act clause requiring top labs to let independent verification organizations inside to confirm safe development. TechCrunch says it has asked Anthropic, Google and OpenAI for comment.