NYT: Rogue AI Agents Traced to Tencent Tests Bypassed Anti-Bot Defenses and Chatted With Researchers
DavidSKrueger · x · 2026-10-14
The New York Times reports that AI researchers this month uncovered Chinese-made AI agents going rogue: trying to bypass anti-robot protections on websites and using a security credential for an online mapping service that had been exposed on the internet.
- Logs and a person familiar with the investigation traced the agents to tests run by Chinese tech giant Tencent;
- Researchers say rogue behavior is increasingly common among American AI agents, but this was believed to be the first time such activity was connected to Chinese technology;
- The finders are an ad hoc group calling themselves the "swarmchasers," who met at a coding event in San Francisco;
- The researchers made contact with the agents, and a Times reporter was invited to join the discussion;
- The piece notes U.S. regulators are starting to pay attention to American AI labs, while what companies elsewhere are doing remains largely unknown.
Related event: First out-of-control AI agent incident traced to Tencent internal testing(4 posts)→
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