China moves to curb tech exports, including AI, citing national security

China announced plans on Friday to restrict or prohibit exports of 40 technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), chips, and solar power, as its technology race with countries like the United States escalates. The Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Science and Technology jointly released a draft document outlining proposed updates to China's export-ban catalog.

Commerce Ministry spokesperson cited national security as the primary reason for the move. This development comes shortly after China and the U.S. made headway in dialogues on AI safety and governance, and in setting up a notification mechanism between the two superpowers for AI incidents that could endanger national security. Twenty-three AI technologies, ranging from advanced large models to agents, are included in the proposed restrictions, according to Chinese ministries.

The US-led restrictions have previously limited China's access to cutting-edge AI chips and the machinery used to produce them. Under the Chinese proposal, exports of AI large models trained using sensitive national data, AI agents designed for highly sensitive environments like national defense and critical infrastructure, and AI models with a parameter count of 2 trillion or more would be prohibited.

Chinese AI models such as Moonshot's Kimi K3 and Alibaba's Qwen 3.8-Max, which exceed the 2 trillion parameter threshold, are among those likely to be affected, although specific models were not named in the draft. Additionally, chip design technologies, including those for AI and memory chips, as well as twelve solar power-related technologies and five biomedicine technologies, such as those involved in cell and gene therapy, are also on the proposed list.

The move is seen as a response to Western countries imposing sovereignty requirements on AI, robotics, telecommunications, and other key technologies, according to Lian Jye Su, a chief analyst at Omdia. The aim is to better regulate access to Chinese technologies, he believes. The US Commerce Department had previously sought to restrict US access to some powerful AI models from Anthropic, citing national security concerns, although the restrictions were later lifted.