Anthropic Says Fable 5 Could Return 'Within Days'

One week after the US government forced the most dramatic AI shutdown in history, Anthropic is signaling the end may be near.

At a press conference in Seoul on June 17, Chris Ciauri, Anthropic’s Managing Director of International, told reporters: “We are very confident that in the coming days, the models will become available again.” It is the most optimistic public statement from any Anthropic executive since Fable 5 and Mythos 5 went dark on June 12.

How the Ban Actually Happened

Reporting from WIRED and The Washington Post has now revealed that the shutdown was a two-step process, not a single decision.

First, the White House identified SK Telecom — South Korea’s largest carrier and a $100 million Anthropic investor — as a Chinese security risk with access to Mythos 5. That alone would have been a targeted revocation.

But then Amazon researchers independently flagged jailbreak vulnerabilities in Fable 5, and the situation escalated. David Sacks, co-chair of the President’s AI council, reportedly gave Dario Amodei an ultimatum: fix the jailbreak or de-deploy the model. Amodei refused both, and the Commerce Department issued a blanket export control order covering all foreign nationals.

Where Negotiations Stand

Senior Anthropic technical staff have been meeting with Commerce Department officials in Washington. National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross joined the working-level talks. Both Amodei and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick are attending the G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains, France, which could provide another venue for resolution.

Meanwhile, Anthropic pressed ahead with opening its Seoul office — its third in Asia-Pacific — and announced partnerships with Samsung SDS, NAVER, and Nexon, even though Korean users currently cannot access the company’s most powerful models.

What This Means for You

If you subscribed during the Fable 5 launch window (June 9–14), refunds are available — but the deadline is tomorrow, June 20.

For now, all other Claude models remain fully available. If you need help choosing the right model for your work, check our complete Claude guide.

The prediction market Polymarket currently gives a 57% chance that Fable 5 will be restored before July 1. We will update this story when access is officially restored.