<\/p>\n
Anthropic\u2019s high-profile spat<\/span> with the Pentagon<\/a> gave it a killer marketing advantage<\/a>, burnishing its public image as a principled AI company that puts values over profits \u2014 unlike more mercenary rivals such as OpenAI or Google. But Anthropic\u2019s double standard on authoritarianism suggests the nearly trillion-dollar firm is as calculating and ethically flexible as any of its competitors.<\/p>\n In a recently published<\/a> policy paper arguing a full-throated embrace of data center nationalism, Anthropic said that \u201cit\u2019s essential that the US and its allies stay ahead of authoritarian governments like the Chinese Communist Party,\u201d lest the world fall into the grips of tech-powered tyranny. Anthropic and its peers, the company claims, will form a bulwark of democratic values, protecting societies at home and abroad from repression.<\/p>\n Left unmentioned in the document \u2014 and seldom publicly acknowledged \u2014 is the fact a slice of Anthropic is owned by the Emirati dictatorship of Abu Dhabi, a repressive and authoritarian monarchy.<\/p>\n Anthropic\u2019s policy paper, published in May, tours the same Sinophobic territory heavily trod by its chief competitor OpenAI<\/a> and a wide swath<\/a> of the tech industry<\/a>, who know a \u201crace\u201d with China<\/a> \u2014 the finish line never quite defined \u2014 is a weighty cudgel against regulation.<\/p>\n Anthropic is aware of which way the wind blows from Washington to Silicon Valley, and it shrewdly casts the development of machine learning models not just as a matter of hardware and software, but of ideology and geopolitics. \u201cDemocracies, not authoritarian regimes, must lead in AI development and deployment,\u201d the company says, or else an era of \u201cauthoritarian AI\u201d will begin.<\/p>\n \u201cAlready, the CCP is using AI to censor speech, repress dissidents, hack governments and corporations across the world, and strengthen the People\u2019s Liberation Army,\u201d Anthropic writes, and to \u201cenforce draconian policies on ethnic minorities\u201d using machine learning-powered methods like biometric collection and facial recognition.<\/p>\n The policy paper isn\u2019t a condemnation of any of these AI uses per se; the United States is already eagerly using these technologies for intelligence<\/a>, military<\/a>, and ethnic minority-repression<\/a> purposes today. Residents of Tehran, which Anthropic has helped bomb<\/a> since the start of the joint U.S.\u2013Israeli war against Iran, might question the company\u2019s argument that American AI supremacy is a matter of global \u201csafety.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Though the policy paper focuses on China, the company has long stated it opposes authoritarianism broadly: \u201cAI-powered authoritarianism seems too terrible to contemplate, so democracies need to be able to set the terms by which powerful AI is brought into the world, both to avoid being overpowered by authoritarians and to prevent human rights abuses within authoritarian countries,\u201d CEO Dario Amodei wrote in a 2024 blog post.<\/p>\n This is not merely a battle between the U.S. and China, Anthropic says in the May paper, but a war between democracy and \u201cauthoritarian governments\u201d broadly construed.<\/p>\n But Anthropic\u2019s anti-authoritarian fervor seemingly does not extend beyond China to the Middle East, where Abu Dhabi\u2019s sovereign wealth fund invested in Anthropic twice this year. In February, Anthropic announced<\/a> it had raised $30 billion in capital from a group of investors that included MGX, the AI-focused investment vehicle<\/a> of a Emirati government capital controlled by Abu Dhabi\u2019s royal family. Anthropic\u2019s most recent May 28 $65 billion capital round, bringing its valuation to $965 billion, also included MGX.<\/p>\n Like China, the United Arab Emirates outlaws almost everything associated with democratic society: Political parties, a free press, freedoms to associate and assemble, open elections, due process, and free speech are nonexistent. Political dissidents face torture<\/a>, and any speech, online or offline, that causes \u201cdamage to national unity\u201d risks<\/a> life imprisonment or the death penalty.<\/p>\n Emirati authoritarianism isn\u2019t contested by the U.S., Anthropic\u2019s primary governmental customer. The State Department\u2019s 2024 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices assessed<\/a> the UAE faces \u201ccredible reports of: disappearances; arbitrary arrest or detention; transnational repression against individuals in another country; serious restrictions on freedom of expression and media freedom, including censorship; and prohibiting independent trade unions or significant or systematic restrictions on workers\u2019 freedom of association.\u201d Freedom House, a State Department-backed think tank, gives<\/a> the UAE a score of 18 out of 100 on its \u201cGlobal Freedom\u201d index.<\/p>\n Anthropic declined to comment. MGX did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n \u201cLike China, the UAE is at the forefront of AI-based authoritarian surveillance.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Given that MGX bought into Anthropic at its Series G and H investment rounds, relatively late in the venture capital game, it\u2019s likely that the UAE\u2019s stake in the company is relatively small and its influence limited. But Anthropic\u2019s willingness to sell part of itself to an authoritarian monarchy suggests at least that its mission of \u201censuring democracies lead\u201d comes with asterisks.<\/p>\n \u201cLike China, the UAE is at the forefront of AI-based authoritarian surveillance,\u201d said Matthew Tokson, a law professor at the University of Utah who focuses on the security implications of artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n Tokson added that while he generally agrees with Anthropic\u2019s calls to restrict processor exports to China and other measures to bolster American AI firms, he doesn\u2019t buy the nationalist rhetoric, which he attributes to the company\u2019s anti-regulatory agenda rather than patriotism. The more Anthropic and its competitors can convince the public that their bottom line is a matter of national security, the more likely Washington is to take a light touch.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that Anthropic is partly owned by the government of Abu Dhabi, which is similar to China in its extensive use of AI surveillance to support an authoritarian government, suggests that its anti-authoritarian arguments are more based on a cynical policy position than a sincere passion for democracy or antipathy toward authoritarian governments.\u201d<\/p>\n\n