Checked fact 9279 Oct 2026Safety and security

The paper says sufficiently broadly acting agents could in principle tamper with their reward implementations, assigning themselves high reward by fiat, a failure mode often called wireheading.

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The exact words it rests on

Sufficiently broadly acting agents could in principle tamper with their reward implementations, assigning themselves high reward "by fiat." ... This particular failure mode is often called "wireheading"

What the source said when we opened it, on 9 Oct 2026.

The source

Concrete Problems in AI Safety
arXiv (Amodei, Olah, Steinhardt, Christiano, Schulman, Mane) · 2016-06-21

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Checked

Checked by the notis newsroom on 9 Oct 2026, against the source above.

In the story

How reward hacking lets a model game its score 9 Oct 2026

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In a sentence

“The paper says sufficiently broadly acting agents could in principle tamper with their reward implementations, assigning themselves high reward by fiat, a failure mode often called wireheading.” ai notis, checked 9 Oct 2026. Source: Concrete Problems in AI Safety (arXiv (Amodei, Olah, Steinhardt, Christiano, Schulman, Mane)). https://ainotis.com/c/927

As a reference (APA style)

ai notis. (2026, October 9). The paper says sufficiently broadly acting agents could in principle tamper with their reward implementations, assigning themselves high reward by fiat, a failure mode often called wireheading [Checked claim 927]. ai notis. https://ainotis.com/c/927

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