Mastodawn

I am convinced we are on the verge of the first "AI agent worm". This looks like the closest hint of it, though it isn't it quite itself: an attack on a PR agent that got it to set up to install openclaw with full access on 4k machines https://grith.ai/blog/clinejection-when-your-ai-tool-installs-another

But, the agents installed weren't given instructions to *do* anything yet.

Soon they will be. And when they are, the havoc will be massive. Unlike traditional worms, where you're looking for the typically byte-for-byte identical worm embedded in the system, an agent worm can do different, nondeterministic things on every install, and carry out a global action.

I suspect we're months away from seeing the first agent worm, *if* that. There may already be some happening right now in FOSS projects, undetected.

A GitHub Issue Title Compromised 4,000 Developer Machines

A prompt injection in a GitHub issue triggered a chain reaction that ended with 4,000 developers getting OpenClaw installed without consent. The attack composes well-understood vulnerabilities into something new: one AI tool bootstrapping another.

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Christine Lemmer-Webber Mar 5

I wrote a blogpost on this: "The first AI agent worm is months away, if that" https://dustycloud.org/blog/the-first-ai-agent-worm-is-months-away-if-that/

People who are using LLM agents for their coding, review systems, etc will probably be the first ones hit. But once agents start installing agents into other systems, we could be off to the races.

The first AI agent worm is months away, if that -- Dustycloud Brainstorms

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Christine Lemmer-Webber Mar 5

Here's another way to put it: if those using AI agents to codegen / review are the *initialization vectors*, we now also have a significant computing public health reason to discourage the use of these tools.

Not that I think it will. But I'm convinced this is how patient zero will happen.

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Christine Lemmer-Webber Mar 5

I know some people are thinking "well pulling off this kind of thing, it would have to be controlled with intent of a human actor"

It doesn't have to be.

1. A human could *kick off* such a process, and then it runs away from them.
2. It wouldn't even require a specific prompt to kick off a worm. There's enough scifi out there for this to be something any one of the barely-monitored openclaw agents could determine it should do.

Whether it's kicked off by a human explicitly or a stray agent, it doesn't require "intentionality". Biological viruses don't have interiority / intentionality, and yet are major threats that reproduce and adapt.

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ArneBab

@cwebber According to #Shadowrun the crash virus is still three years away.

https://shadowrun.fandom.com/wiki/Crash_Virus_of_2029

"Fun" fact: In Shadowrun the Crash Virus learned to kill humans who connected their brains to the net. It was the start of lethal internet input.

Crash Virus of 2029

The Crash Virus of 2029 was an attack on February 8, 2029 by a virus on the world's computer systems. It was a virus that caused damage beyond any known viruses in the past, erasing data and burning out hardware across the world, spreading mercilessly across the Internet. It was eventually cleaned up and isolated by Echo Mirage, but the virus had the unusual ability to induce lethal biofeedback on members of the cybercommando team. The effect of the Crash Virus ranged from destabilizing world go

Shadowrun Wiki

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Tiota Sram Mar 5

@ArneBab @cwebber well via AI psychosis that part is already in the bag sort of. The great part is the human doesn't need to jack in or anything: they just need to have a conversation with the agent.