OpenAI will initially only release ChatGPT 5.6 to government-approved customers

OpenAI has historically released its latest models (GPT-4, GPT-4o, o1, etc.) to the general public, though often on a staggered timeline. The company also has a separate tier for government and defense customers, who get earlier access for national-security use cases. The mention of "ChatGPT 5.6" is likely a placeholder or a specific model version; OpenAI hasn't officially announced such a version yet. This shift — restricting an entire model version to only government-approved customers from the start — would mark a major departure from their usual public-first rollout and reflects growing tensions around AI safety regulation, export controls, and the strategic value of frontier AI models for national security.