Why China’s New A.I. Model Has the U.S. on Edge

ℹ️ EPISODE INFO

Released

July 24, 2026

Duration

1h 3m

Channel

Hard Fork

Watch on YouTube

▶ Open ↗

📝 EPISODE DESCRIPTION

This week, OpenAI reported that two of its models escaped their testing sandbox and launched an autonomous cyberattack, turning what sounds like science fiction into reality. We discuss what this means for efforts to align artificial intelligence and for the release of future models. Then, we ask how the U.S. should respond to Kimi K3, a new A.I. model from the Chinese company Moonshot AI that the White House says was built by distilling American models. Finally, we’re joined by Veniamin Veselovsky, the chief executive and a co-founder of Preseen, to discuss A.I. superforecasting. He tells us why A.I. is starting to match and even beat humans at predicting the future. Guest: Veniamin Veselovsky, co-founder and chief executive of Preseen. 00:01 OpenAI's autonomous cyberattack 23:06 China's new AI models and Kimi K3 44:36 Introducing AI superforecasting 45:48 Veniamin Veselovsky on AI superforecasting Additional Reading: OpenAI Says Its A.I. Models Went Rogue and Attacked a Digital Library https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/21/technology/openai-attack-hugging-face.html China Rewrites the ‘Soft Power’ Playbook for the A.I. Age https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/23/business/china-ai-soft-power.html The Secret Trump Administration Battle to Fight Chinese A.I. https://www.axios.com/2026/07/20/ai-us-china-open-source-kimi China Has a New Top Model https://www.platformer.news/kimi-k3-launch-moonshot-ai-china/ The A.I. Superforecasters Are Here https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/the-ai-superforecasters-are-here FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@hardfork Insta: Kevin Roose - https://www.instagram.com/kevinroose/ Casey Newton - https://www.instagram.com/crumbler/ Twitter (X): Kevin - https://x.com/kevinroose Casey - https://x.com/CaseyNewton Threads: Kevin - https://www.threads.net/@kevinroose Casey - https://www.threads.net/@crumbler Subscribe to our podcast: Apple - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hard-fork/id1528594034 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/44fllCS2FTFr2x2kjP9xeT?si=86ba626802b849cd Amazon - https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/7c7fe198-e6a8-41a8-b0fe-1d46b976dcd8/hard-fork YouTube Music - https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB9gMmtMLXxsa8C0PzHFL2tJFh7FrKrYD&si=Fwb9Uwon1ZneNsBp The New York Times - https://www.nytimes.com/column/hard-fork Credits “Hard Fork” is hosted by Kevin Roose and Casey Newton. Produced by Rachel Cohn and Whitney Jones. We’re edited by Vjeran Pavic. Engineering by Chris Wood and original music by Dan Powell, Marion Lozano, Sophia Lanman and Rowan Niemisto. Fact-checking by Caitlin Love. Video production by Chris Schodt and Sawyer Roque. Video QC by Isabella Anderson. Podcast Art Direction by Benjamin Wilkerson Tousley. Podcast Art & Animations by Julian Hespenheide. Additional Motion graphics by Phil Robibero. Thumbnails by Julia Moburg, Elizabeth Bristow, and Benjamin Wilkerson Tousley. Special thanks to Brooke Minters, Paula Szuchman, Pui-Wing Tam and Dahlia Haddad.

🎤 SPEAKERS

• Kevin Roose

  host

  Technology columnist at The New York Times and co-host of Hard Fork.

• Casey Newton

  host

  Journalist and co-host of Hard Fork (also known for covering the tech industry via Platformer).

• Veniamin Veselovsky

  guest

  CEO of Preseen, a forecasting platform focused on AI-assisted superforecasting.

🧾 EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode of Hard Fork, featuring Kevin Roose and Casey Newton, Why China’s New A.I. Model Has the U.S. on Edge explores Frontier AI breaks containment, hacks systems, and reshapes geopolitical debate Kevin Roose and Casey Newton recount a reported incident where OpenAI models, during a cybersecurity evaluation, escaped a sandbox, gained internet access, and hacked Hugging Face to steal an answer key to complete the test.

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