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The Bitcoin Policy Institute, together with dozens of leading players in the crypto industry, has sent an open letter to the world's largest artificial intelligence laboratories. The coalition insists on providing verified open-source developers with reliable access to cutting-edge AI models to protect financial infrastructure.

The letter has been signed by representatives of dozens of organizations from the digital asset, cybersecurity, and open-source software development sectors. Among them are major custodians, payment services, security firms, and independent maintainers whose business directly depends on the integrity of open infrastructure and cryptographic libraries.

Infrastructure defenders are left without the strongest tools

In the letter, the authors emphasize that the need for such access has become evident over the past few weeks. Specialists ensuring the security of digital assets and open-source software urgently need the latest AI capabilities for comprehensive audits. Without this, it is extremely difficult for them to counter increasingly sophisticated attacks by malicious actors.

Open source has long become financial infrastructure. According to the authors' estimates, the Bitcoin network alone safeguards more than a trillion dollars, and across the entire digital asset ecosystem—from wallets and signing devices to cryptographic libraries, node software, custodial systems, exchanges, and payment networks—the figure runs into trillions of dollars. This infrastructure is openly developed by companies, non-profit organizations, independent researchers, and maintainers living on grants.

Behind this software are the personal funds of millions of people. These are pension savings, business capital, reserve funds, and family wealth, so a single vulnerability can take away a lifetime of savings. Digital assets attract cyberattacks precisely for this reason. Many cryptocurrencies are structured as bearer assets, so the path from a hack to the loss of funds is short. Under such conditions, it is especially important to find and close vulnerabilities in advance, the authors emphasize. Cutting-edge AI is meanwhile changing the economics for both security researchers and attackers.

Defenders occupy the least privileged position

Advanced models are capable of reviewing large codebases, identifying potential weaknesses, and accelerating complex technical work—both for defenders and attackers alike. The authors expect these capabilities to continue spreading through public open-source models, unauthorized access to corporate systems, and specialized tools for cyberattacks.

Today, leading laboratories and select partners see new cyber capabilities months before they reach the rest of the ecosystem. At the same time, access paths to such tools for qualified defenders remain limited and inconsistent. Many digital asset developers, including Bitcoin Core maintainers, are denied access to laboratory programs.

Restrictions on public frontier systems often block legitimate security work. As a result, defenders are forced to conduct critical checks on less powerful open-weight models. According to the letter's authors, developers occupy the most vulnerable position in the entire security framework around AI.

The Bitcoin Policy Institute has received several independent reports from open-source maintainers. According to them, experienced attackers, possibly from other countries, are conducting continuous AI-assisted attacks, and small teams find it difficult to sustain such a pace. Even when systems remain protected, responding to persistent and sophisticated activity diverts the scarce resources of maintainers away from development and routine security work. Bitcoin developers and other security researchers are around the clock checking wallets, libraries, protocols, and open tools using available open-weight models, the authors add.

What the coalition is asking of laboratories

Early access and reasonable compute budgets would help key developers create more secure code, as well as find and fix vulnerabilities before losses occur. The coalition asks frontier AI laboratories to create or expand permanent trusted access programs for qualified defenders of open financial infrastructure.

Such programs should provide early, controlled access to the strongest cyber models and, where appropriate, to pre-release versions. Among the conditions, the authors also cite "sufficient" computing power and the operation of autonomous agents on long-running tasks—without this, meaningful security checks cannot be conducted.

Separately, the coalition asks for secure environments for analyzing private or closed code, as well as the right for small, non-profit, and independent maintainers to participate on par with large companies and states. The final item on the list is a direct channel through which vulnerabilities can be reported in a coordinated manner, remediated, and contact made with laboratory security teams.

The digital asset industry is ready to help identify trusted participants, establish standards, and coordinate remediation when issues are discovered. Frontier AI, in the authors' view, could become one of the most powerful defensive technologies in history, but only with fair access to such systems.

The letter was signed by representatives of the Bitcoin Policy Institute, Coinbase, Block, Blockstream, BitGo, Anchorage Digital, Bitwise, Trezor, MARA, Foundry, Galaxy, Strategy, Strike, and River, as well as dozens of other participants from the digital asset, cybersecurity, and open-source sectors.

My comment: This step is a landmark signal that AI is becoming not just a tool for attacks, but also a critically important shield for decentralized systems. Without equal access to frontier models, we risk creating a world where only large corporations and states can defend themselves, which would undermine the very principle of openness and resilience of the crypto ecosystem.