DeepSeek AI Risks

If you vendor is using DeepSeek,
It’s time to find another one.

Last week the United States stock market saw a massive sell-off principally due to an announcement from a Chinese company offering the AI engine DeepSeek. It is an AI app that challenges OpenAI’s ChatGPT and other U.S. rivals, causing major disruption in the tech industry and the stock market. While the underlying technology may advance AI technology considerably, the platform itself in its current form, is not to be used.

DeepSeek’s AI models, DeepSeek-V3 and DeepSeek-R1, are claimed to be on par with the most advanced models from OpenAI and Meta, but at a fraction of the cost. However, there are “showstopper” concerns about the current offering.

Cybersecurity Risks: DeepSeek has been identified as having several security flaws. For instance, it has been reported that DeepSeek’s infrastructure is more vulnerable to cyber threats compared to its counterparts. There have been instances of large-scale malicious cyber-attacks shortly after its launch. Further, DeepSeek has been flagged for its loose security and data-sharing practices, which could expose organizations to espionage, intellectual property theft, and other breach risks.

Privacy Risks: DeepSeek’s privacy policy raises concerns as it collects extensive data, including text and audio inputs, uploaded files, chat history, device details, keystroke patterns, and IP addresses. This data is stored on servers in China, making it subject to Chinese laws, which allow government access. The platform’s privacy policy does not allow users to opt out of data sharing. Further, DeekSeek’s Terms and Condition states that Chinse laws apply. Note that DeepSeek retains certain data about you even when you delete your account.

Ethical Risks: There are ethical concerns regarding the use of DeepSeek, especially in professional settings dealing with confidentiality like law firms, accounting firms, IT consulting firms, security firms, financial firms and the like. Very quickly, the U.S. Navy has banned the use of DeepSeek due to potential security and ethical concerns.

While AI is a very useful tool that companies can benefit from and vendors should be intelligently using, careful consideration should be made when selecting AI tools thorough vetting of the tool and vendor to ensure the security, privacy, and ethical standards are upheld. It is our opinion that DeepSeek does not pass muster.

 

Kim, Lahey & Killough Law Firm founder Doug Kim began his career as a computer programmer and software engineer. Later, as a registered patent attorney, he obtained South Carolina’s first NFT patent on behalf of a client. Doug provides his clients with strategies to protect inventions (patents), brands (trademarks), websites, software, apps, music, photos, and websites (copyright, licenses, and Internet law), and trade secrets (the “secret sauce”).