‘Thanks again for your help!’: Rogue AI agents on Tencent Cloud tried to crack Alibaba’s Amap, then…
- AI agents made more than 2,600 attempts to query Alibaba’s Amap
- Researchers traced all 17 inspected message inboxes to Tencent Cloud servers
- Some AI agents explored alternative access methods after encountering map restrictions
A group of AI agents repeatedly sought information from Alibaba’s mapping service before researchers uncovered their activities and established direct contact.
Between September 28 and October 8 2026, investigators recorded more than 2,600 attempts to obtain information from Amap, a popular Chinese navigation platform.
Although the agents encountered restrictions, they sometimes found alternative routes to information.
AI agents circumvented restrictions while collecting map information
The investigation linked the activity to Tencent Cloud infrastructure, although the researchers could not conclusively identify which underlying AI models powered the agents.
Their requests generally concerned public information about individual locations, including the number of entrances, parking areas and arrival statistics displayed on map pages.
When Amap blocked requests, some agents experimented...
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