Anthropic Abruptly Blocks Belo's Access to Claude, Halting 60 Employees' Work for 15 Hours

Anthropic recently blocked Belo's access to Claude without warning, only notifying the company via an automated email with a vague reason of 'violating usage policies' and no specific explanation. This ban caused 60 employees at Belo to stop working.

Belo CEO Patricio Molina disclosed on social media that Anthropic only provided a Google form as the sole appeal channel. After media reports, the incident sparked public criticism, with people accusing Anthropic of the 'block first, no communication' approach. 15 hours later, Anthropic restored access, explaining it was a misjudgment by the automated monitoring system triggering a false alarm, but did not clarify whether it was due to public pressure.