{"slug": "threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials", "title": "Threat actors are posing as AI crawlers to hunt for exposed credentials", "summary": "Threat actors are disguising automated scanning as traffic from AI crawlers operated by OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Perplexity and other companies while searching websites for exposed credentials and configuration files, according to GreyNoise. Researchers noted that nothing in a request proves the crawler's identity, as any program can announce itself as ClaudeBot or Googlebot.", "body_md": "Attackers are disguising automated scanning as traffic from AI crawlers operated by OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Perplexity and other companies while searching websites for exposed credentials and configuration files, according to GreyNoise. (Source: GreyNoise) “Every program that visits a website announces itself in one line of the request. Chrome says it is Chrome. Googlebot says it is Googlebot. Anthropic’s crawler says it is ClaudeBot. Nothing in the request itself proves any of it is true,” researchers … [More ](https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2026/08/31/ai-crawlers-scan-exposed-credentials/)\n\nThe post [Threat actors are posing as AI crawlers to hunt for exposed credentials](https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2026/08/31/ai-crawlers-scan-exposed-credentials/) appeared first on [Help Net Security](https://www.helpnetsecurity.com).", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials", "canonical_source": "https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2026/08/31/ai-crawlers-scan-exposed-credentials/", "published_at": "2026-08-31 14:39:22+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-31 14:54:56.402390+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-policy", "ai-safety"], "entities": ["GreyNoise", "OpenAI", "Anthropic", "Google", "Perplexity"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/threat-actors-are-posing-as-ai-crawlers-to-hunt-for-exposed-credentials.jsonld"}}