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The Decoder
Our evaluation of OpenAI's GPT-5.5 cyber capabilities
In a recent evaluation, OpenAI’s GPT-5.5 showed significant advancements in cybersecurity tasks, achieving a pass rate of 71.4% on expert-level challenges. The model successfully completed a 32-step corporate network attack simulation, which would typically take a human expert around 20 hours, in under 10 minutes. This indicates that the performance trends observed with recent AI models may not be isolated incidents but part of a broader improvement in cybersecurity capabilities.
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Published 19 Aug 2026, 20:10 UTC10 min read
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Summary
TL;DR
- GPT-5.5 achieved a 71.4% pass rate on expert-level cyber tasks.
- It completed a corporate network attack simulation significantly faster than a human expert.
- The evaluation included a suite of 95 narrow cyber tasks testing various skills.
- Advanced tasks involved complex skills like reverse engineering and vulnerability exploitation.
- Results signal a trend of increasing proficiency in AI models for cybersecurity.
Interesting facts
- GPT-5.5 costs only $1.73 in API usage to complete complex tasks.
- The model solved a challenging reverse-engineering task in just 10 minutes.