US officials are examining the national security concerns associated with the Chinese artificial intelligence app DeepSeek, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said.
The National Security Council is reviewing the app’s impact, indicating a potential threat to the dominance of US AI companies, reported Reuters.
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DeepSeek recently launched an open-source AI model, R1, claiming it rivals or outperforms US competitors like OpenAI, Google, and Meta Platforms in various benchmarks.
This development led to a significant drop in technology stocks, erasing nearly $1trn in market value for companies tied to AI, including Microsoft, NVIDIA, Oracle, and Alphabet, reported Bloomberg.
Microsoft and OpenAI are investigating potential unauthorised data access by a group allegedly linked to DeepSeek. Microsoft security researchers observed possible data exfiltration via OpenAI’s application programming interface.
Microsoft, a technology partner and the largest investor in OpenAI, informed the company of the activity, sources told Bloomberg.
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By GlobalDataSuch activity could violate OpenAI’s terms of service or suggest that the group took steps to bypass OpenAI’s data restrictions, sources said.
When asked in an interview on Fox News if intellectual property theft led to the rise of DeepSeek, White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks said: “Well, it’s possible. There’s a technique in AI called distillation, which you’re going to hear a lot about, and it’s when one model learns from another model.”
“I think one of the things you’re going to see over the next few months is our leading AI companies taking steps to try and prevent distillation … That would definitely slow down some of these copycat models,” he added.
OpenAI acknowledged the risks from PRC-based companies attempting to distill US AI models. “We engage in countermeasures to protect our IP,” an OpenAI spokesperson stated, emphasising collaboration with the US government to safeguard advanced models from adversaries.
The emergence of DeepSeek’s low-cost AI model has raised concerns about the market dominance of US AI companies.
Former president Joe Biden’s administration imposed export restrictions on AI chips to hinder China’s development of AI.
Meanwhile, President Trump urged US companies to focus on maintaining competitiveness.
He also stated that the launch of DeepSeek AI should serve as a “wake-up call” for US companies, adding that they might gain from using more affordable AI solutions to achieve similar advancements without high costs.
