Bank of America engaged an army of external contractors to address software vulnerabilities that were exposed by advanced artificial intelligence models, including Anthropic’s Mythos, according to comments made by CEO Brian Moynihan following the bank’s third-quarter earnings release.
Moynihan disclosed that the company deployed 1,000 contractors during the second quarter to assist with patching efforts, alongside 3,000 existing employees working in that area. The bank spent “a couple hundred million plus” in the third quarter on software remediation and regulatory matters related to anti-money laundering compliance. The CEO characterized the heightened spending as a temporary response to the security risks posed by frontier-level AI models that can identify decades-old software flaws.
The bank’s response reflects the dual nature of artificial intelligence technology in corporate environments. While AI tools can enhance productivity and reduce operational costs, their capacity to discover and potentially exploit legacy vulnerabilities has forced major financial institutions into defensive measures requiring significant capital investment and personnel allocation.
Moynihan indicated that the company expects remediation expenses to decline as patching work progresses. He noted that Bank of America maintains approximately 130 internal AI projects, with savings from these initiatives projected to grow from $300 million in the current period to $700 million in 2027. The bank reduced its head count by roughly 3,400 employees over the past year, though the extent to which AI contributed to this workforce reduction remains unclear. The CEO sought to reassure investors that the spike in remediation costs represented a temporary surge rather than a sustained increase in operating expenses.
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