(Bloomberg) — The Canadian federal government suppressed a chatbot application released last month by Chinese software company DeepSeek.
“Due to serious privacy concerns associated with the inappropriate collection and retention of sensitive personal information, and as a precautionary measure to protect government networks and data, it is recommended that departments and agencies restrict the use of the DeepSeek chatbot on government devices,” Chief Information Officer Dominic Rochon wrote to federal government departments in an email seen by Bloomberg.
Shared Services Canada — an agency in charge of the government’s information technology network — has already restricted the app on all devices it supports, Rochon said in the memo circulated on Thursday. He urged other departments to “consider blocking the application and website” on their networks and devices.
The US also wants to ban the DeepSeek app on government-issued devices under a bipartisan bill introduced Thursday. The lawmakers who sponsored the bill said Americans are sharing highly sensitive, proprietary information with DeepSeek, risking access by the Chinese Communist Party.
In 2023, the Canadian government removed TikTok, another Chinese-owned platform, from government mobile devices and blocked the application from being downloaded. It cited “concerns about the legal regime that governs the information collected from mobile devices” as a reason behind the decision.