The Future of Life Institute released a report rating nine top AI companies on safety, with none receiving an A grade. Anthropic earned the highest score of C+, while OpenAI and Google DeepMind received C, Meta got D+, and DeepSeek, xAI, and others received F. This report highlights a critical gap in AI safety governance as companies rapidly develop transformative AI without robust risk management plans. It underscores the need for stronger safety standards and transparency in the industry. The report notes that many companies have shifted from banning military use of their AI to actively seeking defense partnerships. Chinese companies Z.ai and Alibaba Cloud deny allegations of military ties, but were still rated low.
Background
The Future of Life Institute (FLI) is a nonprofit founded in 2014 to steer transformative technologies away from large-scale risks, focusing on existential AI risk. The institute's report evaluates companies on criteria such as risk assessment, transparency, and accountability. Z.ai is a Chinese AI company known for its GLM models and was blacklisted by the US in 2025. DeepSeek is a Chinese AI company founded in 2023, notable for low-cost, high-performance models like DeepSeek-R1.