Greg Kroah-Hartman, one of the key developers of the Linux kernel and responsible for its stable branches, has begun public testing of a new fuzzing tool called “Clanker T1000,” writes xrust. The tool, which uses elements of artificial intelligence, is designed to identify vulnerabilities in program code.
According to the specialized blog It’s FOSS , the name «clanker» (slang for «tin can») is an ironic reference to a derogatory term for robots, while the T1000 index refers to a character from the film «Terminator».
Testing stages
The first tests took place in an isolated branch of the repository under the same name “clanker”. Initially, the checks affected the ksmbd and SMB subsystems. Based on the test results, Croah-Hartman presented a series of three patches, accompanied by a call for increased vigilance on the part of the community.
“They pass my very limited tests, but please don't trust them. Make sure I'm not making this up before you accept it,» the developer said in the patch note.
Later resource monitoring Phoronix showed that within 48 hours Kroah-Hartman released additional fixes for USB, HID, WiFi and architecture drivers LoongArch. All changes are marked with a special Git tag: Assisted-by: gregkh_clanker_t1000.
The role of the person and the position of management
Experts emphasize that AI in this case does not act as the author of the code. The tool only points out potential errors, while the final analysis and writing of corrections is left to the person.
This approach coincides with the position of Linux creator Linus Torvalds. Earlier at the Open Source Summit in Japan, Torvalds noted that the community is exploring the possibility of expanding the toolkit with AI, but expressed more interest in automating patch checking and code analysis than in code generation by neural networks.
Analysts say the Kroah-Hartman experiment marks the beginning of careful integration of AI assistants into the development of mission-critical open source software.
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Xrust Greg Kroah-Hartman tests AI search tool «Clanker» bugs in the Linux kernel
