DHS orders US civilian agencies to remove DeepSeek technology and halt purchases
The Department of Homeland Security published a Federal Register notice ordering federal civilian agencies to remove DeepSeek products from their IT systems and stop buying its products and services. The order also covers third-party tools built on DeepSeek's models and bars DeepSeek from participating in federal government contracts. Issued under a 2018 supply-chain security law and signed by Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, the notice says DeepSeek's account-generation process collects personally identifiable information and may digitally fingerprint users, raising the risk that sensitive data could be transferred to the Chinese government, and that its models could contain malware or other security vulnerabilities. The order is dated July 24 but was made public only on Monday; Engadget noted it came days after DeepSeek released a new model.
Restrictions had already covered a Pentagon IT agency, the Commerce Department and the Navy; the order extends them to all federal civilian agencies and blocks DeepSeek from federal contracts.
The Department of Homeland Security just banned the use of DeepSeek’s technology across much of the federal government.
In a notice posted on Monday, the DHS ordered federal civilian agencies like the Department of State to remove any products from the Chinese AI lab DeepSeek, and any third-party services that rely on DeepSeek AI models.
“DeepSeek’s account generation process collects personally identifiable information (PII) and may also track and digitally fingerprint users,” Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said in an accompanying note from July that was made public only on Monday. The administration fears that this sensitive data collected by DeepSeek could then be transferred to the Chinese government. The models themselves can also include malware, Mullin warned.
DeepSeek use has already been restricted across several parts of the government. The Chinese AI lab caused mayhem in the American AI industry early last year with the release of its R1 model, which boasted high capabilities at a fraction of the cost of its American counterparts. While the stock market was busy experiencing a trillion-dollar wipeout over the release, the U.S. government deemed DeepSeek a “profound threat” to national security, and both the Navy and the Department of Commerce were quick to instruct personnel not to use DeepSeek’s models.
#DeepSeek#US Department of Homeland Security#Markwayne Mullin#Federal Register#Trump administration#DeepSeek R1