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August 16, 2026

OpenAI delays model release citing safety review

Also: Google DeepMind undergoes major reorganisation‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ 

X-Risk Daily

Sunday 16 August 2026

Transformative AI
OpenAI delays model release citing safety review
OpenAI has slowed development of an upcoming model, codenamed Astra, after internal evaluations found the company "cannot rule out critical cyber capabilities" in the system, according to Axios, which first reported the pause on 7 August.

Also in this issue

Transformative AI
Google DeepMind undergoes major reorganisation
Geopolitics & Conflict
Trump says US will claim Strait of Hormuz as Iran war continues
Geopolitics & Conflict
Israeli strikes kill 11 in southern Lebanon, deadliest since June truce
Geopolitics & Conflict
South Korea proposes talks to formally end Korean War
Research
Researchers monitor hidden reasoning traces across frontier closed models
Research
Anthropic's $50bn compute buildout shows financing is no brake on AI scaling

… and 14 more in the full briefing

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