Australia Prohibits Government Systems and Equipment from Using DeepSeek

Australia has banned all government systems and equipment from using DeepSeek’s artificial intelligence (AI) services, becoming one of the first countries to take direct action against this AI start-up in Chinese Mainland.

Australian Home Minister Tony Burke stated in a statement that all DeepSeek products, applications, and services will be removed from government systems on national security grounds, effective immediately. He stated that the threat assessment by the country’s intelligence agency found that the technology posed an unacceptable risk.

Burke said: “Artificial intelligence is a technology full of potential and opportunities, but when our institutions find national security risks, the government will not hesitate to take action.” In order to prevent external criticism of Australia’s move, DeepSeek is only from the Chinese Mainland. He added that the government’s approach “has nothing to do with specific countries, focusing on the risks faced by the Australian government and our assets”.

This action does not involve personal devices of ordinary citizens, but Burke encouraged all Australians in the statement to think about how their personal data is used online and take measures to ‘understand their online footprint and protect personal privacy’.

Italy was one of the earliest countries to ban DeepSeek. The Executive Yuan of Taiwan, China and its subordinate government agencies, the US Congress, the US Department of Defense and the Navy, the US Space Agency and Texas have all announced that DeepSeek has been banned.