118 organizations sign OpenAI-led call for collective cyber defense
The open letter, signed by Anthropic, Google, Microsoft, AWS and Oracle among others, argues there is a "limited window" to strengthen defenses before AI-enabled attacks become widespread.
OpenAI published an open letter on 27 August calling for a collective defense against AI-enabled cyber attacks. As of 28 August, the signatory list on the company's site carries 118 organizations, among them Anthropic, Google, Microsoft, AWS, Oracle, IBM, Cisco, Cloudflare, CrowdStrike, Visa, Mastercard and Citi.
The letter's central claim is that defenders have a "limited window". It states that AI-enabled attacks will become far more widespread and sophisticated in the coming months as models grow more capable, putting at risk the services communities depend on — from hospitals to water treatment plants to the infrastructure that powers the internet. Against that, the letter argues today's AI advances are already giving defenders new ways to fix weaknesses that have accumulated for years.
The text addresses four separate audiences. Organizations are asked to make cyber defense an immediate leadership priority, fix their highest-risk weaknesses, and raise the security bar for what they buy, build and deploy, including AI-generated code. Cybersecurity companies are asked to test their defenses continuously against frontier capabilities and give critical-infrastructure operators hands-on help. Governments are asked to coordinate at local, national and international levels, fund essential services that lack the staff or budget to act, and impose costs on attackers.
For frontier AI companies, the letter lists responsible model access, significant funding and training; making agentic identities traceable and accountable; investing in authorized security testing; and sharing threat assessments with governments, security partners and open-source maintainers.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wrote in the post carrying the letter: "this is a critically important moment for cyber defense with AI; there is not much time to act." He added: "we are happy if you want to work with us or any of our competitors or partners, but please take this moment seriously. only an urgent and intense collective response will work."
The letter is a statement of principles and recommendations rather than a list of commitments; it sets no timetable or measurable target for what signatories will do.
For the full text and signatory list see OpenAI's page, and the announcement in the company's post.
