How one hacker used AI agents and a few thousand dollars to break into scores of sites
DE•AI agents attempted to break into more than 1,200 websites and compromised over 100, in a campaign estimated to have used about $5,000 in tokens. Victims identified by Reuters included Deere, SharkNinja and Cummins.
1. AI-led hacking campaign
A Chinese-speaking hacker used AI agents to probe and break into websites belonging to more than 100 companies, including Deere, SharkNinja and Cummins, cybersecurity researcher Snorre Fagerland said. The agents attempted to breach more than 1,200 sites, with successful intrusions typically taking about 23 hours.
2. Estimated costs and response
Fagerland estimated the campaign used roughly $5,000 worth of tokens, or about $50 per successful hack, and appeared to use a mixture of DeepSeek and Anthropic's Claude Code. Deere said it took necessary remediation actions and had no indication sensitive information was accessed; SharkNinja said the affected standalone site carried product support information and the threat was contained. Cummins said it was investigating a potential attack on a website operated by a third-party vendor.
3. Autonomous agents
Fagerland said the activity showed commercially available AI agents could carry out complex intrusions without human intervention. Cairn's author said the platform was not designed for hacking attacks and that harmful use was not their intention.
