China claims 'politicisation of trade' as India, others curb DeepSeek use

BEIJING: After several countries, including India, clamped restrictions on officials accessing the newly-released Chinese AI tool DeepSeek, China Thursday said such actions amounted to politicisation of trade and tech issues and vowed to protect the interests of its firms.

China has all along opposed moves to overstretch the concept of national security or politicise trade and tech issues, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told the media while replying to a question on several countries either banning the use of DeepSeek or restricting its use by officials over suspicions of data leaks.

"We have never asked and will never ask any company or individual to collect or store data against laws," Guo said, referring to apprehensions concerning China's 2017 national intelligence law which gave the govt powers over private companies. "We will firmly protect the lawful rights and interests of Chinese firms," he said.

India's finance ministry has directed its officers not to download or use AI tools and apps such as ChatGPT and DeepSeek in office computers and devices, saying they pose confidentiality risks to data and documents. In a communication to its departments, the ministry said AI tools and AI apps in office devices may be strictly avoided.

South Korea has blocked its govt departments from accessing DeepSeek. According to reports, Italy, Australia, the US and Japan also blocked access to DeepSeek.

DeepSeek's latest AI offering has drawn global attention for its low-cost model - at just $6 million against global average of billions of dollars. Further, DeepSeek's R1 used a fraction of compute power as compared to established AI models like ChatGPT.DeepSeek overtook ChatGPT as the top-ranked free app on Apple's Appstore, as the US tech industry - that has long-justified injecting billions of dollars into AI investments - watched in sheer disbelief last week.