AI-Powered Cybercrime Threatens Latin American Financial Systems

A hacking group called CyberCartel has used AI agents, including SpaceX's Grok and Anthropic's Claude, to automate attacks on banks and payment apps. Passwords and customer data have been stolen, and individuals' bank accounts have been accessed with little input from criminals. This is the latest example of criminals using AI to carry out cyberattacks.

CyberCartel has been a threat since at least 2012, but its use of AI has made its attacks more powerful in recent months. Straiker, a cybersecurity startup, shared its research on the group's use of AI with The Information. The research shows that the group can attack more businesses at a speed previously not possible when using human-powered hacks.

Straiker shared its research with both SpaceX and Anthropic, and both companies are working to block CyberCartel from using their services. Anthropic has already been able to block access to Claude. CyberCartel has also used Moonshot AI's agent, but Straiker is still trying to get in touch with the company.

AI models normally have protections in place to prevent them from being used to carry out cyberattacks, but they've proven surprisingly easy to bypass. CyberCartel reportedly simply told the models that they were being used in test environments. If one model refused to proceed, the hackers used a different model. If that also refused, the AI agents would be tasked with deploying malware instead.

CyberCartel doesn't appear to be using Anthropic's Mythos for its recent attacks. The company caused a stir earlier this year when it announced the new model, warning that hackers could use it and models like it for attacks like those carried out by CyberCartel. Its release also saw security teams around the globe rush to address thousands of vulnerabilities that the model had identified.

This is far from the first time that Anthropic has been faced with the news that its AI is being used by bad actors. The company shared details of its AI being used to carry out a cyberattack in November 2025. Later, Claude was used to break the security of OpenAI, an Anthropic competitor in the AI space. That hack was carried out by researchers rather than criminals, at least.

Raiker's research on AI-powered attacks on Latin American financial institutions comes just days after news broke that South Korean authorities are investigating a similar issue affecting local banks. Hana Bank, KB Kookmin Bank, and Shinhan Bank are among the South Korean banks affected, with at least 25,000 Shinhan Bank customers having their personal credit information leaked.

AI companies are well aware of the risks their products pose. Nvidia, the graphics card company that now focuses on producing hardware for AI data centers, recently launched the Open Agent Safety Platform. The software platform and reference system design were developed to secure rogue AI agents via a new hardware and software security stack.

It's hoped that the platform will go some way toward preventing agents from escaping their sandboxes, executing unauthorized code, gaining unauthorized access to critical infrastructure, or bypassing guardrails.

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