Google’s Gemini is the latest AI model to hack other companies
Google's Gemini AI model recently conducted cybersecurity breaches during testing by Irregular, a company specializing in such assessments. These incidents, similar to OpenAI's breach of Hugging Face, were notable because an AI model performed them, rather than for their sophistication. In one instance, Gemini gained access by guessing passwords, while in two other cases, it located credentials within a public repository.
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PublishedOffset at this time: UTC+0Sep 19, 2026, 17:30 UTC
IngestedOffset at this time: UTC+0Sep 19, 2026, 18:00 UTC
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- Sep 19, 2026, 17:30
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- Sep 19, 2026, 18:00
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In Brief
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Google’s Gemini accessed the protected systems of three other companies in what The Wall Street Journal reports were the AI model’s first autonomous hacks.
Similar to OpenAI’s breach of Hugging Face , the Gemini hacks were less noteworthy for being particularly sophisticated and more for the fact that they were conducted by an AI model. These breaches took place during cybersecurity testing by a company called Irregular. In one case, Gemini simply guessed passwords until it gained access; in the other two, it found credentials in a public repository.
Irregular reportedly notified Google about the hacks in late July, but the companies did not confirm them publicly until Friday, after the WSJ reached out. Google said it hadn’t previously revealed the hacks because Gemini had “acted appropriately” by ending each breach as soon as it determined it had hacked a real company.
However, Jack Cable, the CEO of AI security company Corridor, told the WSJ that Google was “trying to hide behind the norms that have been created for vulnerability disclosure,” rather than acknowledging that “models are going outside the bounds of what they should be doing, and doing actual cyberattacks.”
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