US bans DeepSeek AI from government use as tech tension with China continues

The United States has prohibited Chinese AI firm DeepSeek from being utilized in most government systems, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The ban, which came into effect at the end of July, applies to civilian agencies including the Department of the Treasury, Department of State, and Department of Justice. However, military departments are exempt from this restriction.

DeepSeek, an open-source AI model, has been viewed as a disruptive force in the ongoing AI technology race due to its accessibility and reduced cost. While the DHS did not specify the exact security concerns regarding DeepSeek, the White House has criticized Chinese AI firms this year. The ban follows earlier criticism of Chinese AI from the Trump administration and American firms, with tech lead Michael Kratsios stating that malicious exploitation of American AI firms by Chinese rivals had occurred.

DeepSeek gained popularity after its initial public release in 2025, with its servers occasionally going down due to high demand. The company's chatbot app is among the most downloaded apps on the Apple App Store, and its AI models are used by US tech companies such as Snowflake, Vercel, and OpenRouter. The popularity of DeepSeek has led to startups flocking to open-source models, as they are significantly cheaper than closed models like Google's Gemini, Anthropic's Claude, or OpenAI's Codex.

Developing DeepSeek's models reportedly cost $6 million (£4.5 million) for its debut version, while OpenAI's GPT-4 incurred roughly $100 million in costs. The latest version of DeepSeek was released last week, and users have praised its performance compared to advanced AI tools from OpenAI on common tasks such as software coding.