The intended purpose is not to be used as a worm but it does not take a genius to figure out that with small modifications such a thing could work relatively well - especially if it uses AI keys from compromised targets. Making the agent self-modifiable is relatively straightforward task and in fact I already did that in another project.

https://github.com/chatbotkit/rook

It's not fully described how things work exactly, but apparently it does not transfer entire LLMs as part of the worm. Now that would be interesting :)

https://palisaderesearch.org/blog/self-replication

https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.06760

The paper is a bit silent on why a such a worm would need an LLM. It seems that brute forcing all known vulnerabilities, script kiddie style on each new machine is about the same.

But apparently that info is too dangerous to release ...

This is the same nonsense that lead to article saying researchers had created a wormhole when all they had done was draw one.

I have a microcontroller with an ROM disk (i.e., physically read only). You're telling me that an AI can find a way around the physics of not being able to mutate ROM and exploit it?

is this papernot’s first paper?

Obvious pattern of using ai to replace human reasoning in a proven methodology of malware distribution, C&C, and network infiltration obviously possible, say researchers.

Researchers use AI to create the torment nexus using commodity hardware, demonstrating the very real threat that AI could enable attackers to create torment nexus nodes using commodity hardware. “It wasn’t even that hard !“ says one researcher. Firmware available to qualified researchers who pinky swear that it will not be leaked.

Researchers set fire to laboratory with gasoline, killing seven volunteer victims, demonstrating that laboratory fires are a real risk and can carry significant consequences, especially when gasoline is involved.

Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.