Treasury Secretary Bessent warns Americans about AI-driven bank account hacks as threats rapidly evolve

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Americans should be concerned about AI-driven bank account hacks, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned Sunday, pointing to growing risks as artificial intelligence tools rapidly evolve and expose new vulnerabilities in financial systems.

“The U.S. government has gotten involved. The AI companies are working with us,” Bessent said on “Sunday Morning Futures.”

“What we had in the past month was a step change in the power of one large language model, but we’re going to see it from the other AI companies.”

This comes after Bessent and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell called a flash meeting with Wall Street bank heads to discuss cybersecurity risks stemming from Anthropic’s AI model, Claude Mythos Preview, a powerful new model that experts have warned marks a profound shift in the technology.

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland

Bessent said the meeting, though “less dramatic” than it seemed at the time, was meant to ensure major financial institutions are prepared for emerging AI-driven cyber threats.

Like others in the Trump administration, he emphasized the importance of the United States maintaining its lead in the global AI race, particularly against China.

“It’s important, Maria, that the U.S. stays ahead here. Imagine if China or some non-state actor were ahead of us…” he said, adding that the government’s role is to maintain safety while enabling AI companies to grow and innovate.

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“There is a very important calculus here between innovation and safety,” he continued.

“And at the U.S. government, we’re going to make sure that things stay safe.”

The rapid advancement of AI has raised concerns among cybersecurity experts that increasingly sophisticated systems could be used to identify and exploit weaknesses in banking infrastructure, potentially allowing bad actors to carry out attacks at an unprecedented scale and speed.

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The pace of development has prompted closer coordination between regulators, financial institutions and AI companies to strengthen defenses and improve resilience, especially as the Trump administration vies for a leading position in the race to the future.

Fox News’ Robert McGreevy contributed to this report.

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