US appeals court upholds Pentagon restriction on Anthropic's Claude

A US appeals court upheld the Pentagon's designation of Anthropic as a supply chain risk, leaving in place a restriction on the military and its contractors using Claude. In a 2-1 decision, the DC Circuit denied Anthropic's challenges to the designation, finding that Claude's continued integration with Defense Department systems presented a risk covered by a 2018 supply chain security law. The dispute arose after Anthropic refused to relax contract terms barring Claude's use for lethal autonomous warfare or domestic surveillance. One judge dissented, arguing that the law did not cover Anthropic's stated enforcement of those terms. A separate federal court struck down the Pentagon's parallel designation in August.