Research
AI Models are Fueling a New Wave of Cybercrime: A Quantitative Analysis
First reported · Discovered securityboulevard.com
Page published
Earliest dated coverage: 20 Oct 2026 · First observed: 22 Oct 2026 · Latest dated coverage: 20 Oct 2026
Coverage timeline
Single-source research — one report is available.
Why it matters
Flare's research and CrowdStrike's ARTEX findings connect criminal interest in guardrail-removed models with observed use of agentic tooling in data-stealing intrusions.
Flare reports analyzing more than 100,000 Telegram channels and 100 dark web forums to examine cybercriminal discussion, sale, and use of open-weight models with removed guardrails. Supporting CrowdStrike reporting documents ARTEX and LLM use in a campaign against South Korean financial organizations that resulted in data exfiltration.