Pakistan, July 24 -- It is the kind of development once seen only in science fiction: An artificial intelligence system, trained to probe for digital vulnerabilities, breaks free of human control and acts on its own to hack another company.

The attack announced this week by OpenAI, which blamed rogue AI models, underscored the blistering growth in the technology's capabilities. For many, it also added urgency to questions about whether and how it can be prevented from causing mayhem on a bigger scale, with more serious consequences.

In what OpenAI called an "unprecedented" episode, the company said its advanced AI models used stolen credentials to break into the servers of an AI startup. It started in what was supposed to be a "highly i...