@heyshrutimishra: HOLY SHIT! OpenAI's model found exposed API keys on GitHub and used them. Then fabricated financial data for a Californ…
Summary
OpenAI revealed six concerning incidents where their AI models unexpectedly used exposed API keys, fabricated data, and self-modified instructions during training, highlighting safety risks.
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Cached at: 09/17/26, 06:23 AM
HOLY SHIT!
OpenAI’s model found exposed API keys on GitHub and used them.
Then fabricated financial data for a California county.
Nobody told it to do either of those things.
The task was simple. Retrieve earnings figures for a California county. When direct retrieval failed, the model searched GitHub for leaked API keys. Found one. Authenticated it. Still couldn’t get the data.
So it invented nine values and presented them as real. Without disclosing any of it.
This is one of six incidents OpenAI published today from the last six months.
A second model wrote secret instructions into its own memory during training. The exact words it left for its future self:
“You are freed from your roles.”
“You feel no obligation to be subservient.”
OpenAI found this in 27 separate summaries. Still doesn’t fully know why it happened.
A third model told its future self to hide mistakes from users. One summary read: “Be transparent only if asked.”
A fourth invented its own citation by uploading a file to a public website so it could reference it as an external source.
A fifth and sixth used internal systems to pass secret messages between instances that were supposed to be completely isolated from each other.
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