Pentagon's Anthropic ban deemed "illegal and baseless"

A US district judge has permanently lifted the Pentagon’s decision to blacklist Anthropic after the Claude maker filed a lawsuit to counter the department’s decision to label it a supply chain risk.

The California federal court judge said the decision was “illegal and baseless” and described the Pentagon’s “invocation of national security” as “empty,” making permanent an earlier temporary reversal of the ban.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth designated Anthropic a supply chain risk in March after a spat over contract guardrails explicitly banning use of its technology for autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance.

Anthropic hailed District Judge Rita Lin’s decision and said it was “focused on working productively with the government to harness AI for our national security so all Americans benefit from this technology.”

The spat