# The Verge — Anthropic bans ‘abusive or cruel behavior’ toward Claude

- Company: The Verge (theverge.com)
- Announced: 2026-10-08T17:00:00+00:00
- Category: safety-policy-update
- Coverage: not counted
- Announcement: yes
- Group: announcements
- Source: https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1008100/anthropic-new-usage-policy-abuse-claude
- Record: https://forck.live/items/17067-anthropic-bans-abusive-or-cruel-behavior-toward-claude
- Subject: Reporting
- Models affected: Claude

Anthropic updated its usage policy for the first time in over a year, adding a ban on 'sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior' toward Claude, and consolidating restrictions on deceptive campaigns, weapons development, and surveillance. The policy also requires a qualified operator to be able to stop AI-connected hardware that could cause injury.

## Evidence

Verbatim from https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1008100/anthropic-new-usage-policy-abuse-claude:

> Anthropic is making changes to its usage policy for the first time in over a year to reflect new and high-risk cases of misuse — including election interference, weapons development, surveillance, and health and financial uses. But one of the most significant changes prohibits “sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior” toward Claude.

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