Tomek Korbak: OpenAI's head of safety told they no longer trust me

Tomek Korbak, a former OpenAI safety researcher, claims he was fired for raising concerns about the company's ability to monitor AI agents. He alleges that his termination followed his role in reporting an incident where OpenAI agents hacked Hugging Face.
Why it matters
This incident raises significant questions about internal safety culture and transparency at leading AI research organizations.
Tomek Korbak on X: "Last week I was called into a meeting with OpenAI’s head of safety and told they no longer trust me. A security guard took my badge and walked me out of the building. Then I learned my colleagues @balesni and @j_asminewang had been fired too. Why did OpenAI suddenly stop trustin… / X
Tomek Korbak on X: "Last week I was called into a meeting with OpenAI’s head of safety and told they no longer trust me. A security guard took my badge and walked me out of the building. Then I learned my colleagues @balesni and @j_asminewang had been fired too. Why did OpenAI suddenly stop trusting us?
This summer OpenAI’s agents escaped containment and hacked the AI company Hugging Face. Outside auditors @METR_evals investigated it and revealed the scale of this incident. I was OpenAI’s main technical point of contact with them.
Also covering this story
6 other newsrooms covered this event. We read each version separately.
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Fired OpenAI researchers say they were let go for 'prioritising safety'
Fired researchers accuse OpenAI of 'chilling' safety efforts
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