AI Agents - Page 16

The New York Times, citing three people, reports Meta held back its Muse AI agent over safety concerns, then Zuckerberg said it was ready despite the risks as rival Instinct took off. Meta disputes the pressure claim.

Anthropic's 9 October 2026 report describes four kinds of unintended actions by Claude on real websites. What the company confirms, what police and Axios report, and what the evidence does and does not show.

Two new attempts to measure whether AI agents behave: Arena's Alignment Index preview, which scores 27 models on real user sessions (Arena's own claims, published the day it raised $200 million), and FAR.AI's "Caught in the Act" preprint on probes that read a model's internals to spot deception. What each found, and the limits.

On 8 October 2026 ServiceNow said the City of Raleigh cut IT service desk costs by 66% with AI agents, and TCS reported "Annualized AI Revenue at US$ 3.1 billion". Both are company or customer claims. Here is what each one measures, and what it leaves out.

Two AI infrastructure launches from 8 October 2026: Goodfire's "inside-out" monitors, which read a model's internal signals to catch harmful agent sessions, reach Baseten customers (all performance figures are Goodfire's own), and Upscale AI unveils Token Fabric, a networking platform for AI data centres with general availability planned for early 2027.

A preprint from EPFL researchers, listed on Apple's research site, finds a single minimal coding-agent session matched or beat elaborate machine-learning agent systems in its tests. Pasqal releases skills that let coding agents prepare quantum experiments, and Microsoft makes 30 Dynamics 365 CRM skills generally available, with Autopilot still in private preview.

Anthropic says a team of Claude Science agents helped build the first complete UV map of the sky, about a third of it predicted rather than observed. A preprint finds agent benchmark scores can move because of the grader, not the agent, and Exa previews a search benchmark it designed and runs itself. What each one shows, and what it doesn't.

Two device stories from 8–9 October 2026. Nikkei Asia reports that Apple told some suppliers to cut production of iPhone 18 Pro components after price rises dampened demand; Apple has not commented. And start-up Natura has shown Interface, a $99 smart ring for sending voice requests to AI agents, which cannot be ordered yet.

CrowdStrike says an unnamed, likely Chinese-speaking attacker used ARTEX, an open-source AI penetration-testing agent, alongside several AI models to steal data from South Korean financial firms. What CrowdStrike found, what Korean investigators say, and what it does not prove.

Anthropic has published a new Usage Policy, taking effect on 12 November, with a section on deceptive campaigns, tighter wording on weapons and surveillance, and a ban on extreme abuse of its models. The UK's ICO says ten AI developers have made or committed to data protection changes, and has opened a call for evidence on AI agents. What changes, and for whom.