Alibaba will reportedly ban employees from using Anthropic’s Claude Code in workplace environments beginning July 10, following allegations that the AI coding assistant contained a hidden mechanism capable of identifying users connected to Chinese networks.
According to a Reuters report citing a person familiar with the matter, Alibaba’s internal decision was based on concerns over an alleged backdoor in the software. The move was first reported by Chinese financial outlet Yicai. Alibaba has not publicly confirmed the ban or responded to requests for comment.
Alibaba will ban the use of Claude Code in office environments from July 10 due to security risks involving the implantation of #backdoors in the LLM developed by US’ Anthropic, according to insiders. The Chinese tech giant recommends employees use its agentic coding platform… pic.twitter.com/4glmOJ53bB
— Yicai 第一财经 (@yicaichina) July 3, 2026
Claude Code is Anthropic’s command-line coding assistant for software developers. Report claim that certain versions of the tool checked whether users were connected through specific proxy settings or system time zones linked to Chinese companies and AI labs. Instead of sending data directly, the software allegedly modified small parts of its internal system prompt when a match was detected.
RELATED: JPMorgan Blocks Anthropic AI Tools for Hong Kong Staff Amid Growing Compliance Concerns
Dispute follows months of tension between Alibaba and Anthropic
The reported workplace ban comes weeks after Anthropic accused operators linked to Alibaba’s Qwen AI lab of attempting to extract Claude’s capabilities through large-scale account abuse.
In a June letter to U.S. lawmakers, Anthropic alleged that nearly 25,000 fraudulent accounts generated millions of interactions with Claude in an effort to distil the model’s reasoning and coding abilities. Alibaba has not publicly responded to those allegations.
Why more organizations are restricting AI tools at work
Alibaba is not the first organization to limit the use of AI assistants over security concerns. Companies including Apple, Samsung, and several major financial institutions like JPMORGAN have previously restricted or banned certain generative AI tools after employees were found uploading sensitive source code, confidential documents, or internal business information into public AI systems. Governments have also introduced workplace restrictions for similar reasons, particularly where sensitive or classified data is involved.
Organizations are increasingly asking where employee data goes, how long it is stored, whether it is used to improve future models, and what hidden system information the software can access. Those questions have become more important as AI assistants move from chatbots into coding, software development, and enterprise operations.
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