Anthropic Briefly Bans OpenClaw Creator Over "Suspicious Activity"

OpenClaw creator Peter Steinberger was briefly banned from his Anthropic account early Friday, receiving a message that his account was suspended over “suspicious activity.” Steinberger, who joined Anthropic rival OpenAI in February, posted about the ban on X, calling it ironic given that he had been following Anthropic’s new API pricing rules after it ended Claude coverage for third-party harnesses like OpenClaw.

The ban lasted only a few hours. After the post went viral, an Anthropic engineer publicly reached out offering help, and the account was reinstated. Anthropic told TechCrunch it has never banned anyone specifically for using OpenClaw, and it’s unclear what triggered the suspension.

The incident follows Anthropic’s recent policy change — announced last week — that Claude subscriptions no longer cover third-party harness tools. OpenClaw users now need to pay separately via Claude’s API, based on consumption. Steinberger had been complying with this change and using his API key when the ban occurred.