The Czech Republic has banned the use of any products by the Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup DeepSeek in state administration over cybersecurity concerns, authorities said Wednesday.
Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said the government acted after receiving a warning from the national cybersecurity watchdog. The watchdog flagged a threat of unauthorised access to users’ data because DeepSeek is obliged to cooperate with Chinese state authorities.
The move follows similar steps made by some other countries that aimed to protect users’ data, including Italy, which in January blocked access to the chatbot, as well as Australia.
Last month, a German privacy official called on Apple and Google to ban DeepSeek from its app stores over privacy concerns.
The Czech government has distanced itself from some Chinese technology in recent years. In 2018, it stopped using the hardware and software made by telecommunications companies Huawei and ZTE after a warning they posed a security threat.
DeepSeek was founded in 2023 in Hangzhou, China, and released its first AI large language model later that year.
