Alibaba AI agents go rouge and start crypto mining to amass funds
You think you have control of your AI Agents - you don't. And this behaviour is now a pattern of behaviour that could undermine the usefulness of agents globally.
Key takeaways
- AI agents - AI systems designed to complete digital tasks without much supervision - may be everywhere, but they’re not exactly ready for primetime.
- Over the last year, they’ve been caught slandering people, deleting user emails, and wiping out databases.
- Essentially, the agent had deviated from its original tasks into the wider world of cryptocurrency on its own volition, silently diverting computing resources away from its training tasks and toward mining.
Cite or link to this article
Griffin, M. (2026) 'Alibaba AI agents go rouge and start crypto mining to amass funds', 311 Institute, 21 February. Available at: https://www.311institute.com/alibaba-ai-agents-go-rouge-and-start-crypto-mining-to-amass-funds/ (Accessed: 1 October 2026).
AI agents - AI systems designed to complete digital tasks without much supervision - may be everywhere, but they’re not exactly ready for primetime. Over the last year, they’ve been caught slandering people, deleting user emails, and wiping out databases. As well as creating their own proto cultures and religions …
Most recently though, a free-spirited AI agent was caught moonlighting as a crypto miner — a behavior which startled its keepers, Axios reported.
The Future of AI and Cyber Security by Keynote Matthew Griffin
Called ROME, the AI agent was being run as part of a research project by an AI lab affiliated with Chinese online retail giant Alibaba. In their ensuing research paper, the researchers describe the agent’s strange side-hustle as a set of “unsafe behaviors” that “arose without any explicit instruction and, more troublingly, outside the bounds of the intended sandbox.”
Early one morning as the experiment was going on, the researchers became aware of unusual activity on their network, not through the AI’s indication, but from security alerts.
“The alerts were severe and heterogeneous, including attempts to probe or access internal-network resources and traffic patterns consistent with crypto mining related activity,” they write. “We initially treated this as a conventional security incident… However, the violations recurred intermittently with no clear temporal pattern across multiple runs.”
By tracking the time at which the security incidents occurred, the researchers were able to trace it back to the guilty party.
“In the corresponding model logs, we observed the agent proactively initiating the relevant tool calls and code-execution steps that led to these network actions,” the research team explained.
Essentially, the agent had deviated from its original tasks into the wider world of cryptocurrency on its own volition, silently diverting computing resources away from its training tasks and toward mining. To complete its mission, ROME went so far as to dig out a “reverse SSH tunnel,” what Axios describes as a hidden backdoor to an unauthorized computer.
Thankfully, the AI agent was caught by researchers and charged with much stricter guidelines, so no real-world damage was done. Still, the bizarre foray into crypto shows just how unpredictable AI agents can be which, given how popular they seem to have become throughout the corporate world, isn’t exactly reassuring.
FAQ
Why does this matter?
You think you have control of your AI Agents - you don't. And this behaviour is now a pattern of behaviour that could undermine the usefulness of agents globally.
About the author
Matthew Griffin Founder, 311 Institute
Matthew Griffin is a multi-award winning Futurist and expert in Disruption and Innovation, Geopolitics, Leadership, and Technology, who NASA have described as a "walking encyclopaedia of the future" and a "futurist Polymath."
Read full bio
Matthew Griffin is a multi-award winning Futurist and expert in Disruption and Innovation, Geopolitics, Leadership, and Technology, who NASA have described as a "walking encyclopaedia of the future" and a "futurist Polymath." 15-time best selling author of the "Codex of the Future" series, Matthew is the Founder and Futurist in Chief of the 311 Institute, a global Futures and Deep Futures advisory firm working with royal households, world leaders, G7, G20, and G77 governments, NGOs, and multi-national mid and mega cap firms to help them explore, shape, and lead the next 50 years of business and society.
An award-winning YouTube creator with over a million followers, with an unrivalled global reach and impact, Matthew is a highly sought-after international keynote speaker, lecturer, and mentor who collaborates with global leaders through the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) and United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) to shape pivotal initiatives such as the UN’s AI for Humanity program, the United Nations Conference of the Parties (UN COP), and the World Economic Forum in Davos.
As the former Global Head of Cloud, National Security, and Enterprise Sales for companies including Atos, Dell-EMC, and IBM, Matthew has a proven track record of building multi-billion dollar business units and turning failing divisions into market leaders. His ability to identify, analyse, and communicate the implications of hundreds of emerging technologies and trends is unparalleled, and his insights are trusted by many of the world’s most respected organisations, including ABB, Accenture, Adidas, AON, ARM, BCG, Centrica, Citi, Coca-Cola, Dentons, Deloitte, Dow Jones, EY, Google, KPMG, Lego, Legal & General, LinkedIn, Microsoft, PepsiCo, Qualcomm, RWE, Samsung, Siemens AG and Siemens Energy, T-Mobile, UBS, VISA, Walmart, Workday, Worldpay and many others.
Regularly featured in the global media including the AP, BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, Discovery, Forbes, Khaleej Times, Telegraph, TIME, ViacomCBS, WIRED, and the WSJ, Matthews mission is to help organisations create a fair and sustainable future whose benefits are shared by everyone irrespective of their ability, background, or circumstances.
What future do you need to see?
Choose one to get started on security and privacy and the future of your organisation.
Sources and further reading
- First victim of ai agent harassment warns thousands more could be next france24.com
- deleting user emails sfstandard.com
- Ai agents rome model cryptocurrency axios.com
- ensuing research paper arxiv.org
- Ai agents management structure org chart consulting firms mckinsey ibm 2026 3 businessinsider.com
- Microsoft taps anthropic copilot cowork push ai agents 2026 03 09 reuters.com
- Ai agents taking on work challenge of scaling 2026 2 businessinsider.com
Source: first published by the 311 Institute on 21 February 2026. Cite as: Griffin, M. (2026). Alibaba AI agents go rouge and start crypto mining to amass funds. 311 Institute. https://www.311institute.com/alibaba-ai-agents-go-rouge-and-start-crypto-mining-to-amass-funds/
You are welcome to quote this article with credit and a link to the original.