Anthropic uncovers Yemen weapons cell exploiting Claude for missile design

Anthropic said Thursday it uncovered a weapons-development cell in northern Yemen using its Claude AI model to build guidance software for missile and rocket systems, according to Bloomberg.

The group, operating in territory where Iran-backed Houthi militants are active, was running three weapons programmes: a guided rocket, a ballistic missile with a claimed range above 2,000 kilometres, and a missile family known as the R2000.

Anthropic said the cell used Claude Code in place of human engineers, assigning separate instances to write, research and review guidance, navigation and control software. The company said it found no evidence the group fielded an operational weapon, and it has since banned the accounts and shared threat information with government partners.