Torvalds: AI Tools Great When Not Causing Unnecessary Pain & Pointless Make-Believe Work
Linus Torvalds has expressed concerns about the impact of AI tools on the Linux kernel's security reporting process. He noted that the influx of AI-generated security reports has led to significant duplication and inefficiency among maintainers. Torvalds emphasized the importance of using AI tools productively to avoid unnecessary work and to enhance the overall experience.
- ▪The recent surge in AI-generated security reports has created a burden on Linux kernel maintainers.
- ▪Many reports are duplicates, leading to inefficiencies in addressing security issues.
- ▪Torvalds encourages users to read documentation and contribute meaningfully rather than submitting random reports.
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Torvalds: AI Tools Great When Not Causing Unnecessary Pain & Pointless Make-Believe Work Written by Michael Larabel in Linux Kernel on 18 May 2026 at 07:54 AM EDT. Add A Comment With yesterday's Linux 7.1-rc4 release are some additional comments by Linux creator Linus Torvalds around AI tooling and the surge in security bug reporting to the Linux kernel due to said LLM-powered tooling. With the uptick in "security reports" generated by AI/LLM tooling, there has been lots of duplicated bug reports from different users reporting their findings from large language models. There have also been many security reports for ancient, ill-maintained drivers and other scenarios where the security reports are ultimately not meaningful or impactful to users in 2026.
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