Cloudflare is automating the handling of submissions to its bug bounty program with Anthropic's Claude Sonnet and is spending only $58 a month, The Register reported on Aug. 4 local time.

According to the report, Cloudflare Chief Security Officer Grant Bourzikas (그랜트 부르지카스) disclosed the figure at a press briefing in Sydney, Australia last week. He explained that using Anthropic's security-focused model Mythos for the same work would cost more than $200,000 a month, and that was why it chose Sonnet.

Sonnet filters incoming submissions, checks for duplicates and assesses whether they are worth human review. Cloudflare said the process used to be handled entirely manually.

Bourzikas said managing the bug bounty program with Sonnet shows the importance of choosing the right model for the job. Cloudflare built more than 200 autonomous agents to handle its internal security work and gained experience in such matching. In the process, it removed most external security tools and replaced some with in-house applications built with help from AI.

He advised against copying the approach as-is, saying Cloudflare's calculations for buying versus building differ from those of other organisations because of its business and the nature of its specialised security challenges. He stressed that while Cloudflare has expertise in making security software, it does not believe in the so-called "end of SaaS" argument that everyone must build their own software systems.

Cloudflare Chief Strategy Officer Stephanie Cohen (스테퍼니 코언) said AI will fundamentally change how vendors work with customers, shifting away from selling packaged software. She forecast vendors will change to a model in which they place resident engineers at client companies and keep building customised software.

Cohen also said the AI industry still lacks a proper business model. She said AI companies do not pay for most of the content used to train large language models, and outlined a plan for Cloudflare, positioned between users and content providers, to offer intermediary services that would allow AI companies to pay publishers for content use through micropayments.