Alibaba bans employees from using Anthropic's Claude AI after the U.S. company accused it of the largest known distillation attack. The ban takes effect July 10.
Alibaba is blocking employees from using Anthropic's artificial intelligence tools for work starting July 10, citing back-door security risks, CNBC confirmed Monday.
The Chinese e-commerce giant placed Anthropic's Claude Code on a high-risk software list, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named discussing internal operations.
The move follows Anthropic's June letter to the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs accusing Alibaba of "brazenly" and "illicitly" trying to extract its AI capabilities. Anthropic called it "the largest known distillation attack" on the company to date. Anthropic's terms of service already bar Chinese companies and other "adversarial nations" from using its models.
Alibaba employees must uninstall all Anthropic models and agent products, switching to the company's own AI assistant, Qoder, the people said. Alibaba and Anthropic both declined to comment.
The ban arrives alongside a wave of online backlash in China against Anthropic, as posts on Reddit and GitHub detailed hidden code meant to detect whether users might be based in the country.
The Financial Times reported Friday that Anthropic is closing loopholes allowing Chinese companies to bypass restrictions and access Claude through third countries. The FT cited sources saying Chinese fintech group Ant had given employees corporate Claude accounts accessed through the company's intranet, which connects to its Singapore-based entity.
The FT also reported that TikTok parent ByteDance does not facilitate direct access to Claude but started a reimbursement program in April letting engineers expense personal subscriptions, which they can access via VPNs. Ant and ByteDance declined to comment on the FT report.
ByteDance's policy, unveiled April 2, aims to encourage staff to "experience and learn" a wider range of AI products, a person familiar with the matter told CNBC. The person asked not to be named discussing internal policies.
Alibaba's BABA stock page carries an Alpha Score of 42 out of 100, labeled Mixed, reflecting the crosscurrents between its core commerce business and the regulatory and competitive pressures now extending into AI access.
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