Amazon CEO Andy Jassy may have been the source of security concerns that led Anthropic to cut off worldwide access to two models on Friday.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Jassy told Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and other government officials that Amazon researchers used Anthropic’s Claude Fable 5 to obtain information that could be used in cyberattacks. The government subsequently imposed an export control ban on the Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models.

An Amazon spokesperson said in a statement that while it’s “not uncommon for governments to seek our counsel on potential security risks,” the company does not “share the details of those discussions.”

The spokesperson also pointed to an update stating that AWS has been affected by the model cut off.

The Information and Reuters similarly reported that Amazon (a major Anthropic investor) had communicated concerns about the security of Anthropic’s models.

David Sacks, Trump’s former AI czar who now co-chairs the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, offered his own account of the discussions, claiming that “a highly credible trusted partner of both Anthropic and the USG […] came forward with a jailbreak.”

Sacks added, “The Admin asked [Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei] to fix the jailbreak or de-deploy the model. Dario refused.”

Anthropic said in a blog post that the capabilities apparently causing government concern are already available in other publicly accessible models.

This post has been updated with a statement from an Amazon spokesperson.

Anthropic’s Fable 5 spent three days as the most capable AI model ever released to the public. It topped the Chatbot Arena leaderboard, crushed OpenAI’s GPT 5.5 on coding benchmarks by double-digit margins, and gave paying subscribers access to Mythos-class reasoning for the first time. Then, on June 12, the US government ordered Anthropic to shut it down.

The result is a strange moment in AI. The model that demonstrably outperforms everything else on the market is the one you cannot use. GPT 5.5, which OpenAI launched in late April under the internal codename “Spud,” is now the strongest model available to developers and consumers, not because it improved but because its only real competitor was removed.

The benchmark gap between the two is not close. On SWE-Bench Pro, which measures a model’s ability to resolve real software engineering issues across open-source codebases, Fable 5 scored 80.3% to GPT 5.5’s 58.6%, a 22-point difference. On SWE-Bench Verified, a curated subset of the same benchmark, Fable 5 reached 95.0%.

The coding benchmarks tell a similar story. Fable 5 leads the Code Arena by 98 Elo points, scoring 1,665 to GPT 5.5’s 1,501. On FrontierCode Diamond, a benchmark designed to test the most difficult programming tasks, Fable 5 scored 29.3% while GPT 5.5 managed 5.7%, and on the broader Chatbot Arena leaderboard Fable 5 sits at number one with GPT 5.5 in fourth.

GPT 5.5 does have one area of strength. On Terminal-Bench 2.0, which evaluates interactive terminal-based coding tasks rather than codebase-level issue resolution, GPT 5.5 scored 82.7% compared to Fable 5’s approximately 88.0%. The gap is narrower there, and the benchmark tests a different skill, executing commands and debugging in real time rather than reading and patching large repositories.

Pricing also favours OpenAI. GPT 5.5 costs $5 per million input tokens and $30 per million output tokens, half the price of Fable 5’s $10 and $50 respectively. For developers running high-volume applications where the performance difference is less critical than cost, GPT 5.5 is the more practical choice even when both models are available.

Fable 5 launched on June 9 as Anthropic’s first Mythos-class model made available to the general public. It offered a one-million-token context window and 128,000 output tokens. Anthropic made it available at no extra cost to Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise subscribers until June 22, a promotional window that the government directive cut short after just three days.

The shutdown came via an export control directive issued on June 12. The government cited a jailbreak vulnerability as the reason for pulling both Fable 5 and the broader Mythos 5 model family. Anthropic has disputed the severity of the finding, saying the vulnerabilities identified are minor, publicly known, and achievable by GPT 5.5 without any bypass techniques, while reports indicate that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy played a role in triggering the government’s review.

The practical consequence is that developers and researchers who were evaluating Fable 5 for production use have had to revert to GPT 5.5 or Anthropic’s earlier Opus models. For coding-heavy workflows, the downgrade is significant. The 22-point gap on SWE-Bench Pro represents the difference between a model that can resolve four out of five real-world software issues and one that handles roughly three out of five.

Whether Fable 5 returns depends on Anthropic’s negotiations with the government over the export control classification. The company has publicly argued that the directive is disproportionate and that the cited vulnerabilities do not justify pulling the model entirely. Until that dispute is resolved, GPT 5.5 holds the top spot by default, the best model available not because it is the best model that exists.

President Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday establishing a voluntary framework for government review of frontier AI models before public release, ending weeks of internal White House conflict over how aggressively to regulate the technology. The order, titled “Promoting Advanced Artificial Intelligence Innovation and Security,” was signed privately without the usual livestream or public ceremony, a contrast with the fanfare that typically accompanies presidential AI announcements.

The final version is substantially narrower than the draft Trump rejected on 21 May, when he scrapped a planned signing ceremony over concerns that the order “could dull America’s edge on AI technology.” The original draft proposed a 90-day mandatory pre-release review period and would have given the government formal evaluation authority over frontier models. The signed version asks companies to voluntarily submit models 30 days before release and participate in a collaborative framework rather than submitting to mandatory testing.

What the order does

The executive order establishes three main mechanisms. First, a voluntary pre-release review framework in which AI developers can engage the government to determine whether models under development qualify as “covered frontier models,” provide access for up to 30 days before planned release, and collaborate on selecting “trusted partners” for early access. The framework is explicitly voluntary, meaning companies can decline to participate without penalty.

Second, the order creates an AI cybersecurity clearinghouse within 30 days, coordinated by the Treasury Secretary, the National Cyber Director, the NSA, and CISA. The clearinghouse will scan for software vulnerabilities, validate discoveries, and coordinate remediation and patch distribution, a direct response to the Mythos crisis that demonstrated how AI-discovered vulnerabilities can outpace existing disclosure and patching processes.

Third, federal agencies are directed to develop benchmarks for assessing AI models’ cybersecurity capabilities and to strengthen the government’s own security defences against AI-enabled threats. The order also addresses AI safety research, though the specific provisions are less prescriptive than what the original draft contained.

What was cut

The differences between the scrapped draft and the signed order reflect the victory of the pro-industry faction within the White House. The 90-day mandatory review was reduced to a 30-day voluntary window. The formal government evaluation authority was replaced with a collaborative framework. The reporting requirements for companies developing powerful models, which would have echoed provisions in Biden’s repealed AI executive order, were softened to avoid what industry allies characterised as regulatory overreach.

Silicon Valley’s objections to the original draft were decisive. AI companies argued that mandatory pre-release testing would slow American innovation, create a competitive disadvantage relative to Chinese firms facing no equivalent requirements, and establish a precedent for government gatekeeping of technology deployment. The signed order addresses those concerns by making participation voluntary and framing the government’s role as collaborative rather than regulatory.

The gap it leaves

The voluntary framework means the order’s effectiveness depends entirely on whether AI companies choose to participate. Companies already engaged in pre-release testing with CAISI, including Google, Microsoft, and xAI, may continue or expand that cooperation. Companies that view government review as commercially disadvantageous or that are racing to ship products can simply opt out.

The EU’s AI Act, entering full enforcement in August, provides a stark contrast: mandatory requirements, statutory authority, and penalties for non-compliance. The Trump order establishes norms and creates institutional infrastructure (the cybersecurity clearinghouse, the benchmark development process) but relies on goodwill rather than obligation.

For the White House, the quiet signing may be the point. The order gives the administration a policy document it can reference when asked about AI oversight, creates structures that could be strengthened later, and avoids a public confrontation with an AI industry whose leaders are among the administration’s most visible supporters. Whether a voluntary framework is adequate for a technology that can discover 10,000 zero-day vulnerabilities in a month is the question the order deliberately leaves unanswered.

Apple’s long-rumored foldable iPhone may have just taken another step closer to reality – or at least another step closer to the internet’s imagination. A newly leaked replica model, believed to represent Apple’s upcoming “iPhone Ultra” foldable device, is now circulating online, revealing what could be one of the company’s boldest design shifts in years.

According to a report from Notebookcheck, the replica showcases a foldable phone with curved edges, a slim profile, and a surprisingly familiar design language that many users are already comparing to existing Android foldables.

If the leak turns out to be accurate, Apple’s first foldable iPhone may not look radically different from competitors after all.

Apple’s foldable iPhone may prioritize familiarity over reinvention

The leaked white replica model shows a book-style foldable design with rounded corners, curved side rails, and a dual rear camera setup positioned vertically on the back panel. The overall appearance has triggered immediate comparisons to devices like Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold lineup and several foldables from Chinese brands.

That familiarity is especially interesting because Apple has historically avoided entering product categories until it believes the technology and user experience are mature enough. The company has reportedly spent years testing multiple foldable prototypes internally while delaying a commercial launch over concerns related to hinge durability, display creasing, and long-term reliability.

The “iPhone Ultra” branding attached to the leak also aligns with previous rumors suggesting Apple may reserve foldable devices for an entirely new ultra-premium category above the Pro Max lineup.

Reports over the past year have repeatedly suggested Apple’s first foldable iPhone could arrive with a large inner display, titanium construction, and a significantly thinner hinge design compared to current foldable competitors. Some analysts also believe Apple is prioritizing minimal display creasing as one of the defining features of the device.

The replica itself, however, suggests Apple may be taking a more conservative design approach externally while focusing its innovation on refinement rather than visual experimentation.

Why this matters

Foldable smartphones remain one of the few major hardware categories where Apple still has no product presence. Meanwhile, companies like Samsung, Huawei, OPPO, and Honor have spent years iterating on foldable hardware.

Apple entering the foldable market could dramatically reshape consumer interest in the category, much like the company previously did with smartwatches and tablets. At the same time, the leak raises an important question: Does Apple still need to create visually unique hardware, or is perfecting usability and ecosystem integration enough?

What happens next

Apple has not officially acknowledged the existence of a foldable iPhone, and current reports suggest the device is still at least a year or two away from launch. Multiple analysts expect Apple’s first foldable device to arrive sometime around late 2027 or beyond, likely positioned as an ultra-premium product with a very high price tag.

For now, replica leaks like this mainly offer hints about Apple’s possible design direction rather than final hardware confirmation. Still, if the rumors prove accurate, Apple’s foldable future may look less like a sci-fi experiment and more like a refined version of a category Android brands have already spent years building.