Security firm Norforge identified a series of cyberattacks involving an army of AI agents that compromised over 100 websites. The breaches targeted companies across the US, Canada, Australia, and Japan, including John Deere, SharkNinja, and Cummins.
The attacks were executed using Cairn, an open-source AI platform designed as a general-purpose problem-solving engine. Researchers discovered more than 20 exposed instances of the platform that appeared to be used for malicious purposes.
The most active attacker utilized fewer than 100 Chinese characters to define intrusion tactics, completing successful breaches in approximately 23 hours. Norforge is currently working to shut down these malicious instances.
In response to the incidents, SharkNinja confirmed that a standalone product support site was affected and the threat has been contained. John Deere stated there is no evidence of sensitive data access, while Cummins is investigating a potential breach at a third-party vendor site.
Cairn creator @le1xia0 stated that the platform was not designed as a hacking tool and emphasized that misuse of the software is a human decision rather than a feature of the engine itself.
