Bank of America Hires 1,000 Contractors to Fix AI-Discovered Flaws

Bank of America has hired 1,000 additional contractors to fix vulnerabilities that advanced AI models discovered in its systems before criminals could exploit them, the bank's chief executive said.

Hiring surge follows AI deployment

CEO Brian Moynihan told CNBC the contractors were hired in the second quarter of this year, adding to the 3,000 people the bank already had working in that area. He said Anthropic's Mythos was among the models used, alongside other AI systems.

Anthropic released Mythos to a limited group of banks, technology companies, and government agencies in April 2026. Moynihan said that when the latest frontier-type models arrived, the bank had to quickly find a way to address the AI-enabled risks they surfaced. He also cautioned that the bank should remain mindful that the people doing the software development are the people trying to sell the bank its services.

Regulators press banks on AI controls

Meanwhile, Reuters reported that regulators in the United States are asking banks how they use autonomous AI agents, how the banks monitor the agents' decisions, limit their authority, and shut them down when necessary.

The European Central Bank has given banks an end-of-October deadline to develop plans to protect themselves from AI-enabled cyber threats.

Spending and enforcement

Moynihan did not disclose how much Bank of America has already spent on fixing the vulnerabilities the AI models found. He said the bank spent more than a couple of hundred million dollars on software remediation and regulatory issues related to anti-money laundering compliance in the third quarter.

This week, the US Department of the Treasury announced it had fined Bank of America $1.2 billion for failure to mitigate and report priority national security risks, including Chinese money laundering networks and illicit finance along the southwest border.

Sources: Cybernews