OpenAI has published its strategy for Strengthening cyber resilience as AI capabilities advance, outlining how it plans to address the rapid evolution of cybersecurity capabilities in its models while managing associated risks. As AI models improve evidenced by capture-the-flag (CTF) performance rising significantly between GPT-5 and GPT-5.1-Codex-Max the company anticipates future systems may reach levels that could “develop working zero-day remote exploits against well-defended systems, or meaningfully assist with complex, stealthy enterprise or industrial intrusion operations aimed at real-world effects,” according to its preparedness framework. To ensure these advances benefit defenders, OpenAI is investing heavily in models and tools designed for defensive cybersecurity tasks, such as auditing code and patching vulnerabilities, and is building layered safeguards that balance risk without hindering legitimate defensive use. Its defense-in-depth approach combines access controls, infrastructure hardening, egress controls, monitoring, detection systems, and continuous red teaming with expert partners, while also training models to refuse or safely respond to harmful requests.
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Recognizing the importance of community collaboration, OpenAI plans initiatives like a trusted access program for cyberdefense to provide qualifying security professionals with tiered access to enhanced capabilities, and has launched Aardvark, an agentic security researcher now in private beta that autonomously scans codebases for vulnerabilities and proposes patches. It will also set up a Frontier Risk Council. This council will gather skilled defenders. They will advise on safe capability limits and the risks of misuse. They will team up with the wider industry, including the Frontier Model Forum, to develop shared threat models and best practices. These efforts show a strong commitment to empower defenders and improve critical infrastructure security. They aim to build real-world resilience through expert-driven safeguards and teamwork. Plans are in place to adapt programs as models and threats change over time.
