Aug 18 2026

OpenAI discloses it paused its largest frontier training run over cyber risk, halting reinforcement-learning training for two weeks and keeping the run on hold after judging an internal model (Astra) could reach the Critical tier of its cyber-capability framework.

SAFETYMODEL

Original reporting

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The new monitoring adds roughly 20% compute overhead. The disclosure came days after OpenAI folded its standalone Preparedness team into other groups, and weeks before a planned IPO. Sam Altman said development had accelerated enough that safety measures risked lagging capabilities.

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OpenAI

Open calls that touch this

OpenAI's Astra maths results survive independent scrutiny · 80%, resolves December 31st 2026
OpenAI never publishes the raw Astra reasoning traces · 75%, resolves February 28th 2027
Anthropic IPOs before OpenAI · 75%, resolves August 6th 2027
OpenAI does not IPO in September · 80%, resolves September 30th 2026
OpenAI signs another $10B+ non-Azure compute deal · 65%, resolves August 6th 2027
A second flagship API adopts time-of-day pricing · 55%, resolves February 17th 2027

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