HalluSquatting Flaw in 9 Major AI Tools Could Let Hackers Build Botnets

A technique called HalluSquatting exploits a fundamental weakness in large language models — their tendency to fabricate answers rather than admit uncertainty. Researchers found that nine widely used AI tools are vulnerable to this method, which attackers could leverage to assemble large-scale botnets. The flaw stems from LLMs confidently generating fictitious package names or URLs, which hackers can register in advance to trap unsuspecting users or systems. This form of attack turns AI hallucination from an inconvenience into an active cybersecurity threat.