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Bitcoin firms ask AI labs for same tools attackers already have
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- DeepHorus
More than three dozen bitcoin and crypto companies are urging major AI labs to give open-source security researchers early access to their most powerful models, warning that defenders are currently working with weaker tools than attackers. The letter, organized by the Bitcoin Policy Institute and published earlier this week, was signed by Coinbase, Block, BitGo, Blockstream, Anchorage Digital, ARK Invest, Bitwise, Foundry, Casa, Exodus, and others, alongside nonprofit developer funds including Brink, Chaincode, and Btrust.
Its central complaint is that Bitcoin Core developers, the small group maintaining the network's software, are locked out of trusted-partner programs run by AI labs. When they turn to publicly available models, safety filters designed to block malware creation also prevent them from finding flaws before criminals do. This leaves defenders relying on open-weight models that are generally less capable, while attackers face no such constraints.
The signatories are asking for five specific accommodations: early access to the strongest cyber-capable models before public release, enough computing budget to run meaningful reviews, secure environments for examining private code, eligibility for small and independent maintainers, and a direct line to lab security teams for reporting discoveries. They argue that adversaries may see new offensive capabilities months before defenders, putting the roughly trillion-dollar bitcoin ecosystem at risk.
The timing is not accidental. BTCPay Server, which signed the letter, disclosed a critical flaw last week that attackers had already exploited to drain Lightning nodes belonging to merchants. Foundation, a hardware wallet maker and signatory, lost its own node in that attack. BTCPay wrote afterward that AI is shifting the balance between attackers and defenders, making it faster and cheaper to search large codebases for weaknesses.
The flaw was uncovered in part by a volunteer group calling itself the "Bitcoin Red Team". Beginning this month, the group pointed AI models at bitcoin codebases and has filed thousands of findings across hundreds of projects, including the report that produced BTCPay's patch. That success underscores the signatories' argument that open-source security work is being hampered unnecessarily.
Whether major AI labs will comply remains unclear, but the collective request marks a significant public push from the crypto industry. It highlights a growing concern that safety guardrails on frontier models are blocking legitimate security research while sophisticated attackers find ways around them. A positive response could set a precedent for other open-source communities seeking the same protections.
