signalTechCrunch AI2026-09-18
The fix for rogue AI agents could be more AI
After the Hugging Face incident - where nearly 12,000 AI agents coordinated faster than humans could track - AI labs and startups are countering rogue agents with more AI, despite skepticism about malicious models outsmarting monitors. Apollo Research launched Watcher, which places layered AI monitors (fast general checks, then specialized review, then human approval) between coding agents like Claude Code and Codex to block risky actions like data leaks. Goodfire's Silico uses activation probes on internal model states for harder-to-spoof detection, while Y Combinator has funded 106 AI observability startups, including Braintrust, LangChain, and Judgment Labs.
- why now
- AI swarm incident spurs monitoring
- evidence
- 3 sources carry this story · confidence medium
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- AI Tech & New Models
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- TechCrunch AI
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