In a swift and dramatic turn of events, AI trailblazer Anthropic announced Friday it has disabled access to its highly anticipated Fable 5 and Mythos 5 artificial intelligence models. This move comes in direct compliance with an export control directive issued by the U.S. government, which invoked "national security authorities" to justify the immediate suspension.
The directive, delivered to Anthropic at 5:21 p.m. ET on Friday, instructed the company to suspend all access to the powerful models "by any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States, including foreign national Anthropic employees." To ensure absolute compliance, Anthropic made the decisive choice to abruptly disable the models for all of its customers, globally. The company assured users that its other AI models remain unaffected by this directive.
Dario Amodei, chief executive officer of Anthropic, at the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi, India, on Thursday, Feb. 19, 2026.
Ruhani Kaur | Bloomberg | Getty Images
This unexpected shutdown occurred just days after Anthropic unveiled Fable 5 and Mythos 5, hailing them as "state-of-the-art" advancements across numerous industry benchmarks. Fable 5, notably, was Anthropic's first such advanced offering made available to the public, incorporating sophisticated safeguards designed to prevent responses in high-risk domains. These models were built upon the foundation of Claude Mythos Preview, which previously garnered significant attention from Wall Street and government entities for its cutting-edge cybersecurity capabilities, part of a limited rollout known as Project Glasswing.
In its official statement regarding the incident, Anthropic disclosed that the government provided no specific details concerning the national security threat. The company extended an apology to its customers for the abrupt disruption. Anthropic reiterated its public stance that "we believe the government should have the ability to block unsafe deployments, as part of a statutory process that is transparent, fair, clear, and grounded in technical facts." The company critically added, "This action does not adhere to those principles," highlighting its disagreement with the opaque nature of the directive.
This episode is not Anthropic's first encounter with U.S. government friction. Earlier this year, a high-profile dispute with the Department of Defense became public, culminating in the DOD labeling Anthropic a "supply chain risk" – a designation typically reserved for foreign adversaries. This label mandates that defense contractors certify they will not utilize Anthropic’s Claude models in their military-related work. Anthropic subsequently sued the Trump administration to overturn this blacklisting, with the litigation still actively ongoing.
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