Anthropic says UAE-linked AI op targeted UN staff over Sudan

AI firm Anthropic has said it detected a UAE-linked influence operation that targeted the Muslim Brotherhood and United Nations experts critical of Abu Dhabi’s alleged role in Sudan’s war. In a report on misuse of its AI models on Thursday, Anthropic said it uncovered and disrupted the broad campaign it linked “with high confidence” to UAE govt officials.Aimed primarily at the Muslim Brotherhood, the operation used the company’s Claude chatbot to generate reports, advocacy materials, social media content and testimony on Sudan.Since April 2023, Sudan has been engulfed in a war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, triggering what the UN has described as one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. The UAE has repeatedly been accused, including by UN experts, of supporting the RSF and fuelling the conflict, allegations Abu Dhabi denies.Anthropic said the operation compiled what it described as “counter-accountability dossiers” on UN special rapporteurs who had criticised the UAE’s conduct in Sudan.Another effort involved appropriating the identity of a Sudanese human rights organisation and drafting testimony for two named individuals so that “materials serving a party to the Sudan conflict would reach the UN as from independent local witnesses, rather than state messaging”.