Tech billionaire Elon Musk has taken a swipe at Anthropic’s controversial AI model “Claude Mythos” with a cryptic but widely shared post on X, formerly Twitter. 

Musk wrote, “Humans using Mythos as seen by Mythos,” along with a clip of a chimpanzee using a hammer and nails as tools.

The post quickly triggered reactions across social media, with many users interpreting it as Musk’s latest jab at rival AI companies and the increasingly intense race to build powerful frontier models. 

“Claude Mythos,” developed by Anthropic, has recently drawn global attention over reports surrounding its advanced cybersecurity and autonomous coding capabilities. The model has been described in media reports as one of the most powerful experimental AI systems currently under testing. 

Musk, who heads AI firm xAI, has repeatedly warned about the risks posed by unchecked artificial intelligence development. He has also been openly critical of competing AI firms, including OpenAI and Anthropic, accusing parts of the industry of prioritising rapid deployment over long-term safety. 

The billionaire’s latest remark comes amid growing debate within the tech community over how advanced AI models should be regulated, especially those capable of discovering software vulnerabilities or generating autonomous code. Reports around Claude Mythos have fuelled both excitement and concern in cybersecurity circles. 

While Musk did not directly mention Anthropic in the post, the reference to “Mythos” was enough for users online to connect it to the company’s experimental AI project, sparking another round of AI rivalry discourse on social media. 

Musk vs Anthropic

Claude Mythos has recently drawn attention over reports related to its advanced cybersecurity and autonomous coding capabilities. The experimental model has reportedly demonstrated unusually high-level performance in identifying software vulnerabilities and complex cyber tasks, prompting both excitement and concern within the tech industry.

Musk’s latest jab also adds to his growing history of public criticism aimed at Anthropic and its Claude models.

Earlier this year, Musk described Claude as “misanthropic and evil,” alleging that the chatbot showed ideological bias and “hates men,” while attacking Anthropic’s Constitutional AI framework.

In another post during a Pentagon-related dispute involving Anthropic, Musk accused the company of “hating Western Civilization” after reports emerged that Anthropic resisted certain military-related uses of its AI systems.