In a major development for blockchain cybersecurity, the OpenAI Paradigm partnership has officially unveiled EVMbench, a groundbreaking benchmarking tool designed to secure the decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. Announced on February 18, 2026, this initiative aims to standardize how autonomous AI agents are evaluated in their ability to detect, patch, and essentially war-game smart contract vulnerabilities. With smart contracts currently securing over $100 billion in assets, the release of EVMbench comes at a critical juncture, promising to transform AI smart contract security from a theoretical concept into a rigorous, measurable defense layer against increasingly sophisticated cyber threats.
Inside EVMbench: A New Standard for Blockchain Code Auditing
EVMbench is not just a passive analysis tool; it is a comprehensive testing environment that pushes the boundaries of blockchain code auditing. Built on a dataset of 120 curated vulnerabilities sourced from 40 professional audits—including data from the popular Code4rena platform and the Tempo blockchain—the tool evaluates AI agents across three distinct capability modes.
The first mode, Detect, challenges AI agents to audit complex repositories and identify high-severity flaws, scoring them on their ability to recall ground-truth vulnerabilities. The Patch mode takes this a step further, requiring agents to fix the vulnerable code without breaking the contract's intended functionality—a nuanced task that has historically baffled automated systems. Perhaps most notably, the Exploit mode allows agents to execute end-to-end fund-draining attacks in a sandboxed blockchain environment. This "red teaming" approach ensures that defensive tools are tested against the same aggressive tactics used by malicious actors.
The Gap Between Attack and Defense
Early results from EVMbench have highlighted a concerning disparity in current AI capabilities. In testing, OpenAI's latest model, GPT-5.3-Codex, achieved a striking 72.2% success rate in the Exploit mode, a massive leap from the 31.9% score recorded by GPT-5 just six months prior. However, the models still struggle more with detection and patching than they do with exploitation. This finding underscores the urgency of the initiative: if autonomous AI agents are becoming highly proficient attackers, the industry must aggressively accelerate their defensive capabilities to prevent a new wave of automated hacks.
Addressing the Surge in DeFi Exploit Prevention
The launch of EVMbench is a direct response to a spate of high-profile security failures that have rattled the crypto industry in early 2026. Recent incidents, such as the exploit of the Moonwell lending protocol and the $3 million theft from CrossCurve, have demonstrated the fragility of current security infrastructures. Disturbingly, some of these vulnerabilities were found in code that was partly written with the assistance of earlier, less secure AI generation tools.
By providing a standardized yardstick for DeFi exploit prevention, OpenAI and Paradigm hope to shift the paradigm from reactive patching to proactive, AI-driven immunity. "Smart contracts secure billions of dollars in assets, and AI agents are likely to be transformative for both attackers and defenders," OpenAI stated in their announcement. The goal is to ensure that as AI accelerates, it serves as a shield rather than a sword, enabling developers to identify critical flaws before they can be deployed to the mainnet.
Investing in the Future of Web3 Cybersecurity
Beyond the technical release of EVMbench, OpenAI is putting significant financial weight behind its commitment to Web3 cybersecurity. The company announced a $10 million commitment in API credits to support the Cybersecurity Grant Program, specifically targeting the protection of open-source software and critical infrastructure. This funding aims to empower researchers and developers to utilize the most capable models for defensive purposes without the barrier of high compute costs.
Additionally, OpenAI is expanding the private beta of Aardvark, its specialized security research agent. By pairing tools like EVMbench with dedicated research agents, the partnership aims to create a robust ecosystem where AI smart contract security evolves faster than the threats it faces. As the crypto landscape matures, the integration of these autonomous auditors into the development lifecycle could become the new industry standard, potentially saving the ecosystem billions in prevented losses.
