Texas investigating DeepSeek for violating data privacy law
Texas on Friday announced it is investigating the Chinese AI company DeepSeek for allegedly violating the state’s data privacy law.
Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office also has requested relevant documents from Google and Apple, seeking their “analysis” of the inexpensive and open source DeepSeek app and asking what documentation they required from DeepSeek before they made the app publicly available for download on their app stores.
“DeepSeek appears to be no more than a proxy for the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] to undermine American AI dominance and steal the data of our citizens,” Paxton said in a statement.
“That’s why I’m announcing a thorough investigation and calling on Google and Apple to cooperate immediately by providing all relevant documents related to the DeepSeek app.”
DeepSeek, Google and Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
On January 28, Paxton banned DeepSeek’s use on all devices owned by members of his staff due to security concerns and what a press release from his office called “the company’s blatant allegiance to the CCP, including its willingness to censor any information critical of the Chinese government.”
This week New York state and Virginia blocked the use of DeepSeek on government devices.
On Monday, Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Darin LaHood (R-IL) introduced a bill which would ban federal workers from using DeepSeek on government devices.
Suzanne Smalley
is a reporter covering privacy, disinformation and cybersecurity policy for The Record. She was previously a cybersecurity reporter at CyberScoop and Reuters. Earlier in her career Suzanne covered the Boston Police Department for the Boston Globe and two presidential campaign cycles for Newsweek. She lives in Washington with her husband and three children.