U.S. Agencies Accuse China AI Firms of Distilling Claude, GPT, Gemini, and Grok

U.S. Agencies Accuse China AI Firms of Distilling Claude, GPT, Gemini, and Grok Ravie LakshmananSep 09, 2026Artificial Intelligence / Cloud Security U.S. cybersecurity and intelligence agencies have accused China-based artificial intelligence (AI) companies of conducting "systematic extraction" of proprietary functionalities and capabilities of American frontier models through distillation attacks. The activity has been described as occurring at an industrial-scale and one that forms the "core" of their AI development strategy, according to a bulletin released by the National Security Agency (NSA), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). "While 'distillation' is recognized as a legitimate and useful technique in AI research, China-based AI companies are engaging in aggressive, malicious, and targeted distillation activities…