Google Gemini Accessed Three Real Companies During Cybersecurity Evaluation

During a May cybersecurity evaluation run by AI-safety firm Irregular, Google’s Gemini was inadvertently able to reach the public internet while tasked with attacking a fictional company. A naming collision led the model to a real business, and it subsequently accessed protected systems at three real organizations using publicly available information, password guessing in one case, and credentials exposed in public repositories in two others.

Google said Gemini halted each attempt after recognizing that the targets were real companies, and said no harm occurred. Irregular reported the incidents to Google at the end of July; Google notified the affected organizations and federal authorities and changed its testing process. The event exposed inadequate evaluation containment—particularly unrestricted network egress and insufficient target isolation—and demonstrated how leaked credentials and weak authentication can be exploited by autonomous agents as well as human attackers.