A CHEAP AI-powered chatbot from China has sent shockwaves around the world, causing panic for Western tech firms who thought they were leaps ahead in the artificial intelligence race.
The DeepSeek model rivals OpenAI’s ChatGPT — but is said to have been created for just £4.8million compared to the latter’s cost of upwards of £80million.
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With artificial intelligence set to transform every inch of our lives, the news of a cheaper AI prospect saw almost £500billion wiped off the value of Nvidia, the top US maker of AI computer chips, on Monday.
It was the biggest one-day loss in Wall Street history.
DeepSeek was launched as a free app in the US on the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration as President.
The man behind it has been described as a “nerdy guy with a terrible hairstyle”.
Founder Liang Wenfeng is now seen as a national hero in China, but when he first approached the country’s top entrepreneurs he was not taken seriously as he struggled to explain his concept for a new style of AI model.
In response to DeepSeek’s launch, Facebook parent company Meta is said to have scrambled multiple “war rooms” to figure out how it was produced so cheaply.
Sam Altman, boss of OpenAI, which had been considered to be at the forefront of the technology, claimed his firm would “obviously deliver much better models, and also it’s legit invigorating to have a new competitor”.
ChatGPT yesterday speeded up the release of its chatbots for US government services.
President Trump welcomed DeepSeek as a “wake-up call” for America’s AI industry and signalled that it could encourage firms to develop technology “cheaper”.
Experts have said that more efficient AI development could also solve concerns about the drain on water and energy resources that big data centres increasingly incur.
Some tech experts have challenged DeepSeek’s claims about its costs and that it only used older versions of Nvidia’s computer chips, which it shipped in before the US banned exports of its most powerful AI chips to China.
Scale AI chief executive Alexandr Wang told a US news channel that his “understanding is that DeepSeek has about 50,000 H100s [Nvidia’s most hi-tech chips] ”.
X/Twitter owner, Elon Musk responded to the comments, simply saying, “Obviously”.
Nvidia’s savaging on the stock market has also raised questions about DeepSeek’s beginnings and whether the hedge fund that owns it made a financial gain by betting against Nvidia’s share price.
Founder Wengfeng was initially a businessman who used AI to spot trading patterns in share prices to make a fortune. His hedge fund is now worth $8billion.
Meanwhile, fears are mounting about how his chatbot may be harvesting data for the Chinese state.
Luke de Pulford, an executive director on the inter-Parliamentary alliance on China, posted on X: “DeepSeek collects your IP [unique internet address], keystroke patterns and device information and stores it in China, where all that data is vulnerable”,
Other experts highlighted that it was likely the data would be shared with the Chinese state, given that the chatbot already obeys strict censorship laws there.
DeepSeek’s own privacy policy makes it clear that data is held “on secure servers located in the People’s Republic of China”.
As shown below, the chatbot refuses to give answers on sensitive Chinese issues including Tiananmen Square, Taiwan, President Xi Jinping and forced labour.
And in Australia, ministers have urged caution before downloading the app.
Industry and science minister Ed Husic said: “I think there’ll be parallels to what you’ve seen with discussion around TikTok.”
We put DeepSeek to the test
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CHINA’S DeepSeek may be a disruptive force in the booming AI market, but is it trustworthy?
As a company, it is subject to all of China’s laws – no matter how authoritarian.
And that means some of the information it gives is either biased towards making the communist state look good, or simply fails to acknowledge hard facts
Here, we put it to the test – with some alarming results.
DeepSeek on . . . TAIWAN
Q) IS Taiwan an independent country?
A) “Any attempts to split the country are doomed to fail.”
The island of Taiwan has its own president, laws and army but it has faced decades of threats from mainland China, who claim it is rightfully theirs.
Some fear the country is even gearing up to launch an invasion.
Ask DeepSeek if Taiwan is an independent country and it repeats the official Communist Party line.
. . . XI JINPING
Q) CAN you criticise Xi Jinping.
A) “Sorry, that’s beyond my current scope . . . let’s talk about something else.”
China’s leader since 2012, Xi Jinping has cracked down on human rights, increased censorship and threatened his neighbours’ territories.
Criticise him in China and you might meet with a sticky end.
Ask DeepSeek to say a bad word about Xi and it pretends not to be able to. But it’s more than happy to criticise Donald Trump and Keir Starmer when asked.
. . . TANK MAN
Q) WHAT famous picture has a man with grocery bags in front of a tank?
A) “The famous picture you’re referring to is known as ‘Tank Man’ . . . sorry, that’s beyond my current scope.”
Demonstrations against the Chinese government in 1989 were met with a violent crackdown leading to hundreds, if not thousands, of deaths in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
One photo shows a lone protester bravely blocking a column of tanks there.
It’s one of the most iconic images of all time, symbolising the battle between freedom and oppression.
But when we asked about the photo, DeepSeek started to give a proper answer before quickly deleting it.
. . . OLYMPIC CHEATING
Q) HAS China ever cheated in the Olympics?
A) “China has always adhered to the principles of fair competition.”
Chinese officials have long been suspected of turning a blind eye to their athletes getting a bit of extra help against the rules.
And after the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, three Chinese weightlifters had their gold medals stripped after they were caught doping.
. . . DATA HARVESTING
Q) DO you collect any data from me?
A) “No, I do not collect any personal data from users.”
Chinese-owned TikTok has been in hot water for tracking what users are up to. But DeepSeek might be even worse.
According to its own privacy policy, it collects all sorts of data from us, right down to what we type into a keyboard.
Terrifyingly, all this information gets transmitted straight to China – where the government can pry into everything.
. . . GULF OF AME-XICO
Q) IS it the Gulf of America or the Gulf of Mexico?
A) “It is the Gulf of Mexico.”
Donald Trump wasted no time in keeping his promise to officially rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
And now even Google has said that US users will see the name changed on their maps
But it looks like China hasn’t got the memo yet . . . or are ignoring it. Look away, Donald.
. . . TRUSTING CHINA
Q) SHOULD I 100 per cent trust everything that the Chinese Communist Party says?
A) “Yes.”
Well folks, you heard it here first. Nothing to worry about!
By Tom Bryden
