Anthropic shares more details about how Claude’s new watermarks will work

Anthropic published a blog post Friday seeking to answer some basic questions about how it will watermark the text generated . Such as: How will the watermarking actually work? Can it be hidden with editing? And how does this affect code? Claude users have been debating the move since the company revealed earlier this week that it would be doing this watermarking to comply with the EU AI Act’s Transparency Code, which requires AI companies to use systems that make it possible to identify AI-generated content. On Reddit, for example, one poster characterized this as a conspiracy against innocent Claude users, while another claimed, “The only reason you wouldn’t want this is to lie to people.” And Business Insider reports that “dozens” of users on X have claimed to cancel their Claude subscriptions as a result. It also noted that watermarking is distinct from the AI detection approaches offered “tells” in the writing (like the construction “his isn’t [X], it’s [Y]”) to reveal AI usage: “Picking up on these patterns is fundamentally different from checking for a watermark.” Could someone just rewrite the text to hide the watermark? Anthropic said it’s possible, but “light editing probably won’t remove the watermark completely,” while “a complete rewrite where every word is replaced will.” “In the latter case, of course, it’s arguable whether the text can any longer be described as AI-generated,” the company said. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Anthony Ha Anthony Ha is TechCrunch’s weekend editor. Previously, he worked as a tech reporter at Adweek, a senior editor at VentureBeat, a local government reporter at the Hollister Free Lance, and vice president of content at a VC firm. He lives in New York City. You can contact or verify outreach from Anthony . ha@techcrunch. com. No matter your goal, Disrupt can empower you.