Anthropic to lift blanket campaign-targeting ban and add hardware safety requirements

Anthropic published a revised Claude Usage Policy that removes its blanket prohibition on personalized vote and campaign targeting and adds requirements for autonomous hardware capable of causing injury. The policy takes effect on November 12. Anthropic says the targeting change permits legitimate civic work, including translated voter information and ballot cure notices. Deceptive targeting and misuse of voters' personal data remain prohibited. For hardware that takes autonomous physical actions, a qualified operator must be able to observe the equipment and stop it. The equipment must also hold a safe state if Claude disconnects. Existing requirements for human review and disclosure in high-risk uses remain unchanged.