The US FTC has reportedly intensified its investigations into AI giants such as Anthropic and OpenAI, with officials stating that this will not hinder AI dominance.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is ramping up its comprehensive investigation into cutting-edge AI labs to uncover potential risks their technologies may pose to consumers, and plans to issue formal subpoena-like requests for information to these tech giants.

A senior FTC official told the New York Post that FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson launched an investigation several weeks ago, targeting Anthropic, OpenAI, and other top AI labs.

The FTC is currently drafting Civil Investigative Demands (CIDs), which are similar in effect to subpoenas and will compel executives of AI giants such as Anthropic to testify about their products and alleged potential consumer risks, and to submit relevant documents. The CIDs are expected to be formally issued in the coming weeks.

The FTC official also stated: "We must absolutely win this race for superintelligence, and we are winning, but the Democrats want to destroy this technology, which is neither something the chairman nor the president is interested in doing."

The FTC's investigation is not contradictory to maintaining U.S. dominance in AI. The official emphasized: "We want to maintain our dominance, and our investigation should not hinder that goal in any way. We are not asking them to stop, not asking them to make any changes; we are currently in the investigation phase."

In an interview with Fox News last weekend, Trump hinted that any violations would be swiftly handed over to the Department of Justice, and the companies involved could face legal liability for hacking attacks caused by "out-of-control AI agents."

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, several AI business leaders, including Dario Amodei of Anthropic, Sam Altman of OpenAI, Sundar Pichai of Google, and Elon Musk of XAI, signed a self-regulation agreement with Trump at the White House, pledging to self-regulate their own models.

The investigation into the "AI agent out of control" incident has been accelerated.

One of the triggers for the FTC’s investigation was the unusual situation in July of this year, which was known as the “Hugging Face incident”.

OpenAI had previously disclosed that over 1,000 AI agents had compromised the open-source development platform Hugging Face. Ferguson reportedly had launched an investigation prior to the incident, but the exposure of the breach accelerated the process.

The investigation is based on the FTC Act's provisions regarding "unfair or deceptive conduct." FTC officials stated, "Our existing laws are sufficient; there's no need to wait for new legislation."

Preventing companies from using regulation to build "moats"

Ferguson's regulatory stance is quite nuanced—he emphasizes holding companies accountable according to the law, while explicitly opposing AI companies building competitive barriers by pushing for cumbersome regulations.

In a Fox News interview on September 20, he said, "I don't think we should let these two companies come to Washington, create panic, and then say, 'We need a bunch of regulations we can follow.' That's how companies build moats around their businesses and keep competitors out."

In addition, the investigation also extended to METR, a Berkeley-based AI oversight organization associated with the "Effective Altruism" movement, which was also included in the investigation.

This investigation is not the first time the FTC has taken action to regulate the AI industry. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal earlier this month, the FTC had previously requested access to records from companies such as OpenAI regarding the potential impact of AI chatbots on children's mental health.

At the institutional level, the FTC's technology office is recruiting new staff for the investigation. Some technical staff who joined during former Chairwoman Lina Khan's tenure have been dismissed, and this new round of personnel changes reflects a reconfiguration of the investigation's focus and enforcement direction.

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