On Wednesday (July 9), Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala announced that the Czech government has banned the use of any services from the Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek by public administrative departments, citing considerations for data security. This decision follows similar actions by other European countries including Germany, Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands, who have also imposed various restrictions on DeepSeek due to data protection concerns.
At a live press conference, Fiala stated, “The government has decided to prohibit Czech public administrative departments from using the artificial intelligence products, applications, solutions, web pages, and network services provided by DeepSeek.”
Fiala pointed out that as a Chinese company, DeepSeek may have obligations to cooperate with Chinese government agencies, potentially allowing Beijing authorities to access data stored on DeepSeek’s servers in China. Although DeepSeek claims to offer AI products comparable to those in the United States at a lower cost, the company has been controversial in the tech industry with its data processing methods raising questions in the U.S. and European markets.
DeepSeek’s data security policies have also faced strict scrutiny in the U.S. and some countries in the Indo-Pacific region. According to its own privacy policy, DeepSeek stores a large amount of personal data, such as requests to its AI programs or uploaded documents, on computers in China.
In April, the U.S. House of Representatives’ Select Committee on China released a report accusing DeepSeek of posing a serious threat to U.S. national security. The report highlighted that while DeepSeek’s AI model may appear as just another AI chatbot providing a way for users to generate text and answer questions, a closer examination revealed that DeepSeek was secretly transmitting acquired personal data to China Mobile, which has connections to the Chinese military, posing a security vulnerability for users.
Australia announced in early February that it had banned all government equipment from using DeepSeek products and services due to the “unacceptable” security risks posed by DeepSeek’s AI model to government technology. In late January, the Indian Ministry of Finance issued a notification instructing employees to avoid using AI tools including ChatGPT and DeepSeek, citing potential risks to the confidentiality of government documents and data.
On January 31, Taiwan’s Ministry of Digital Development issued a statement warning public agencies and critical infrastructure to restrict the use of DeepSeek AI products based on information and communication security considerations.