Agents Rewrite the Rules

AI-driven attacks are exploiting vulnerabilities faster than security teams can respond, raising new questions about how organizations protect their systems and manage autonomous agents. On the latest episode of This Week in AI, host Vicki Reyzelman of Akamai discusses the PHP2Shell vulnerabilities, weaknesses in OpenAI's agent monitoring, and why traditional security practices need to adapt as agents become more capable and independent.

Walmart's new agent gateway and Anthropic's Claude auto mode illustrate different approaches to controlling autonomous agents, while Amazon and major banks are setting limits on third-party agent access. Vicki also examines NVIDIA's data center investments and the growing interest in nuclear energy as AI demand strains electricity infrastructure. In healthcare and scientific research, developments include Microsoft's diagnostic AI, OpenAI's efforts to accelerate drug discovery, and an experiment that used AI to design proteins targeting scorpion venom. These advances could help researchers work faster, although clinical testing and human oversight remain necessary.