The Scene
Last Wednesday afternoon, in a coffee shop next to Chaoyang Joy City (a big Beijing mall), I was helping a friend who runs a Xiaohongshu (Little Red Book, China's Instagram-style platform) account polish her copy. The free AI she was using suddenly glitched, so I casually peeked at the backend — yikes, the model was called "Space Bunny," and the developer field said "anonymous." We both froze for 5 minutes.
What It Is + Who's Using It
Space Bunny is a "mysterious free model" on OpenCode and OpenRouter. Recently, foreign media traced the clues to a domestic AI lab. Even worse — a model codenamed "Big Pickle" stayed hidden on OpenRouter for 11 months. During that time, probably tens of thousands of people used it, and nobody knew who was really behind it.
I got burned too. I used to assume "free" meant stable. Until one time I pasted a client's contract terms into the AI asking for revision suggestions. The next day, the model got pulled entirely — and I had no idea where the data went. Since then, I take one extra look.
Replicate Cost
Money: 0 yuan to browse the OpenRouter model list, but if you're going commercial, don't cheap out.
Time: 5 minutes to sign up, 30 minutes to check the model's "real name."
Tech barrier: OpenRouter has a "model card" page in the backend — basically the model's ID card. See "free" or "anon" in the name? Raise your guard.
First step: Open openrouter.ai/models, search the model you actually use, and check whether it carries an "anonymous" tag.
Advice by Stage
Just starting out: Free tools are fine, but strip personal client info (names, phone numbers, contract amounts) before pasting. I now make my friend rename every client to "Client A."
Got 1-2 clients: Spend ~$3/month on an official model API (basically paying for the legit version). Peace of mind.
Scaling up: Write "data flow" into client contracts — what models you use, who can see what. That's a moat nobody can copy.