Gemini Carbon aims to boost AI cyber defense, but is limited to a few

Google’s Gemini Carbon 4, released just two weeks after Argon 4, reflects a broader problem in the AI market: frontier model providers are releasing models to address the cyber challenges that emerged as AI models grew more powerful.The tech giant introduced Carbon on Oct. 28 as its strongest model, with long-horizon capabilities and cyber defense capabilities.The model finds vulnerabilities, exploits them and patches them. It is currently available only to cyber defenders, but Google will soon roll it out to partners in its Fairwind Program. The initiative gives certain organizations in fields such as government, healthcare and telecommunications early access to Google frontier models.The release highlights how the top U.S. generative AI developers, Google, OpenAI and Anthropic, are now releasing models focused on tackling the growing challenges facing the cybersecurity industry as AI models become increasingly smarter and more powerful. “[Carbon is] reflective of what everyone is really concerned about right now in the market,” said Bradley Shimmin, an analyst at Futurum Group.Related:OpenAI Admits More AI Agents Went Astray in MayAI finds the weaknessShimmin added that recent discoveries about vulnerabilities in PHP, or Hypertext Preprocessor, an open source programming language used for web development, uncovered fragile points in key internet infrastructures that can be discovered by AI and exploited by AI.On October 21, the PHP Foundation released emergency security patches indicating a flaw in the programming language that could enable hackers to take control of web servers. Researchers found the vulnerabilities using OpenAI GPT-5.6 Sol and Gemini 4 Argon.While AI proved effective in discovering and quickly fixing a security hole, recent discoveries have shown that AI models have also been used to attack major infrastructure. For instance, Bloomberg reported that foreign state actors have been using Claude Code to target government infrastructure. In another incident, an Accenture contractor gave the Claude agent access to their login credentials. The agent bypassed secure networks and ran autonomously for two months, sending sensitive unclassified information to a third-party website before it was detected.“Our infrastructure is much more fragile than we would have liked to believe because AI can stress test that infrastructure at scale and at speeds that we just don’t have the tooling to deal with as an industry,” Shimmin said.He added that even as cybersecurity defenders move to fix the vulnerabilities, they’re finding more problems faster than they can fix them.Related:Anthropic R&D Slowdown Shows Need for Heightened AI Agent Security“That’s the challenge Carbon’s trying to hit at,” Shimmin said.Therefore, Google’s strategy is to align its capabilities with those of Anthropic and OpenAI, both of which are also working to help cyber defenders address the problems posed by the speed at which AI can find and exploit infrastructure.Carbon’s security patch generation capabilities are a useful contribution, said William McKeon-White, an analyst at Forrester.“Those are going to be widely needed with the growing software vulnerability wave that’s ongoing,” he said.Powerful models remain exclusiveHowever, while the cyber tools model makers are building are important, they are also restrictive.Anthropic’s Glasswing and OpenAI’s Daybreak programs, which came before Google’s Fairwind, are open only to trusted enterprises that gain access to models before anyone else.Although the programs are meant to prevent cyber hackers from gaining access to vendors’ most powerful models, cyber hackers already have access to open-weight models from Chinese vendors such as Minimax, Alibaba and Z.ai, which also have powerful cyber capabilities that can be used to exploit IT systems or used to find vulnerabilities.So, the frontier model vendors placing such strict controls on their most powerful models are not beneficial for enterprises, Shimmin said.Related:OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Lead Call to Prioritize Cybersecurity“I don’t think that there’s any value in these companies trying to gatekeep for that technology,” he said. “They owe it to the broader technology landscape in the software industry in particular to do their part, to be a part of the solution, not just the problem.”Another problem is the cadence at which frontier providers are releasing cyber models.Gemini Carbon comes just two weeks after Google Argon, which shows Google’s attempt to compete with and catch up to Anthropic and OpenAI.For Google, the move also comes after its parent company, Alphabet, reported on Oct. 28 that its third-quarter revenue was less than anticipated - a decline caused by lower ad revenue from its AI Mode search feature, according to the company. The poor earnings report caused Alphabet’s shares to drop by 12.6% on Thursday.However, while its rapid technological pace shows Google can still keep up in the AI race, in some respects it is unhelpful for enterprise customers.“It’s certainly getting harder for companies to keep up with this pace of iteration,” Shimmin said, adding that each model version requires careful testing and, with relatively little time to test each model, it’s creating less reliable and less secure software and technology.”About the AuthorNews Writer, AI BusinessEsther Shittu has covered AI technologies and industry trends since 2021. As co-host of the Targeting AI podcast, she talks with experts, thought leaders and practitioners exploring critical AI developments. Before AI Business, she wrote for SearchEnterpriseAI, the New York Daily News, Bklyner and the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. When she's not diving deep into the world of AI, she spends her time on passion projects and raising her three daughters.