7The Batch (DeepLearning.AI)·
Cloudflare introduces default-block controls for AI training and agent bots, plus per-request monetization
Cloudflare announced new AI traffic controls that block training and agent bots by default while allowing search indexing crawlers, effective September 15, 2026. Publishers can toggle access granularly by bot use case, and multi-purpose crawlers (e.g., Googlebot, Bingbot) are subject to the most restrictive setting applied. Cloudflare also introduced BotBase, a public bot classification database, and a forthcoming per-request monetization tool allowing publishers to charge AI agents for web access. The move affects nearly 20% of the internet and raises the cost of web data acquisition for AI training, with disproportionate impact on smaller AI developers.
Related guides (3)
Related events (8)
The Batch digest: China bans anthropomorphic bots, DiffusionGemma, Anthropic Claude Code study, Seedance 2.5, Code Arena
A multi-story digest covers five distinct AI developments: ByteDance and Alibaba are shutting down customizable humanlike AI agents ahead of China's July 15 Interim Measures for AI-Based Anthropomorphic Interactive Services; Google released DiffusionGemma, an experimental 26B MoE diffusion-based text model generating 256-token blocks at 1,000+ tokens/sec on H100; Anthropic published findings from 400,000 Claude Code sessions showing domain expertise—not coding skill—drives agentic output volume; Seedance released version 2.5 of its video generator with higher resolution and longer clips; and Arena.ai expanded Code Arena to fullstack web development evaluation. The China regulatory action is the most significant item, representing a concrete enforcement moment for AI persona/companion regulation.
Enterprises power agentic workflows in Cloudflare Agent Cloud with OpenAI
Cloudflare is integrating OpenAI's GPT-5.4 and Codex models into its Agent Cloud platform, targeting enterprise customers building and deploying AI agents at scale. The partnership positions Cloudflare's infrastructure as a secure, high-performance runtime for agentic workloads. This represents a significant enterprise distribution channel for OpenAI's latest models.
Internet Traffic Driven By AI Tripled Last Year, Study Shows
Human Security's 2026 State of AI Traffic and Cyberthreat Benchmark Report, based on over 1 quadrillion internet interactions, found AI-driven traffic nearly tripled in 2025, with agentic browser-style traffic growing ~80x year-over-year (though still only 1.7% of AI-driven traffic by December). OpenAI accounted for ~69% of automated traffic, Meta 16%, and Anthropic 11%. The report also flags a 47% rise in malicious scraping and new security challenges as legitimate AI agents increasingly mimic historically suspicious bot behaviors like account creation and transaction completion.
Simon Willison on Temporary Cloudflare Accounts for AI Agents
Simon Willison covers a Cloudflare feature enabling temporary accounts for AI agents, which allows agents to provision and use cloud resources ephemerally. The post highlights an emerging infrastructure pattern where AI agents are granted scoped, time-limited credentials rather than persistent access. This is relevant to the agent-tool ecosystem as it addresses identity and resource management for autonomous agents.
Uber caps employee usage of AI coding tools like Claude Code to manage costs
Uber has implemented usage caps on AI developer tools including Claude Code, citing cost management concerns. Simon Willison flags this as a notable signal about enterprise AI tool economics. The move highlights the tension between productivity gains from AI coding assistants and the operational costs of deploying them at scale.
OpenAI begins testing ads in ChatGPT for Free and Go tier users in the U.S.
OpenAI is rolling out an ad test in ChatGPT for logged-in adult users on Free and Go tiers in the United States, with paid plans (Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, Education) remaining ad-free. Ads are clearly labeled, visually separated from answers, and personalized using in-session data that is not shared with advertisers. The system excludes ads from sensitive topics (health, mental health, politics) and users predicted to be under 18, with user controls for dismissal and data deletion.
OpenAI adds Admin API capabilities for spend alerts, model allowlists, and billing
OpenAI released new Admin API features enabling enterprise administrators to manage spend alerts, model allowlists, data retention settings, and hosted tool permissions. The update also adds querying of granular billing line items. These additions expand programmatic control for organizations deploying OpenAI at scale.
Cloudflare releases 'Skills' library for teaching agents to build on Cloudflare platform
Cloudflare has published an open-source TypeScript repository called 'Skills' designed to teach AI agents how to build on Cloudflare's infrastructure. The project has accumulated 2,008 GitHub stars. It represents Cloudflare's effort to make its platform more accessible to AI agent workflows.