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This Week in Startups · Friday, August 28, 2026

AI's growing capability for hacking and its financial implications for hackers

The conversation highlights how advanced AI models are becoming powerful tools for hacking, with the cost of using these models decreasing. Hackers can now leverage tools like DeepSeek for extended periods to find vulnerabilities, potentially leading to widespread security breaches.

companyDeepSeek

The tape

3 quotes
The counter to that is making a tool that can infinitely, depending on how much compute you have access to, is infinitely better at hacking than the white hats and is relentless and has an unlimited amount of time and effort and intelligence to pair hacks together.
It's also, it's not just the availability of this intelligence, it's getting cheaper.
So, hackers are are budget constrained. They can't just run Fable 5 all day and do all the things you're saying. But they can now afford to use DeepSeek.
Heard on This Week in Startups — “Breaking down Nvidia's Hugging Face and Poolside bets | E2331, published Friday, August 28, 2026. Heardvine summarizes and quotes with attribution and timestamps, and links to the original everywhere.
Transcribed via Gemini audio transcription · $0.09