Taiwan says government departments should not use DeepSeek, citing security concerns

Taipei, Taiwan - Taiwan's digital ministry said on Friday that government departments should not use Chinese startup DeepSeek's artificial intelligence (AI) service, saying that as the product is from China it represents a security concern.

Democratically-governed Taiwan has long been wary of Chinese tech given Beijing's sovereignty claims over the island and its military and political threats against the government in Taipei.

In a statement, Taiwan's Ministry of Digital Affairs said that government departments are not allowed to use DeepSeek's AI service to "prevent information security risks".

"DeepSeek's AI service is a Chinese product, and its operation involves cross-border transmission and information leakage and other information security concerns, and is a product that jeopardises the country's information security," the ministry said.

The ministry will continue to keep abreast of relevant technological developments and make "timely adjustments" to its information security policies in order to safeguard security, it added.

Earlier on Friday, South Korea's information privacy watchdog said it plans to ask DeepSeek about how the personal information of users is managed.

Authorities in France, Italy and Ireland and other countries have also been looking into DeepSeek's use of personal data.

By Monday, DeepSeek's free AI assistant had overtaken U.S. rival ChatGPT in downloads from Apple's  app store and global investors dumped U.S. tech stocks, wiping $593 billion off chipmaker Nvidia's  market value in a record one-day loss for any company on Wall Street.

(Reporting by Ben BlanchardEditing by Frances Kerry)