The Chinese mainland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs has firmly stated that China does not support the illegal collection or storage of user data by businesses or individuals. This declaration comes in response to recent actions by several nations to restrict access to DeepSeek, a prominent Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) service that has recently topped the U.S. iPhone app store charts.
Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun emphasized that the Chinese government prioritizes data privacy and security, operating strictly within legal frameworks. Guo also addressed concerns about the politicization of national security, trade, economics, and technology, reaffirming China's commitment to protecting the legitimate rights and interests of its companies on the global stage.
DeepSeek Brings About Real-World Benefits
DeepSeek has taken an open approach to developing large AI models. Its latest offerings, including the V3 language model, R1 reasoning model, and Janus Pro vision model, are freely available for download. Additionally, the company has published research papers detailing the training methods of these models, allowing other developers to replicate them using their own datasets.
When downloaded and run locally, DeepSeek's models do not require an internet connection and are designed to prevent the transmission of users' private data to third parties. This feature distinguishes DeepSeek from closed models developed by companies like OpenAI and Google. Marc Andreessen, a venture capitalist and co-founder of Netscape, described DeepSeek-R1 as \"a profound gift to the world.\"
Moreover, DeepSeek offers its online chat service free of charge, providing users worldwide with tools to understand and create internet memes, solve problems using logic, and generate innovative ideas.
Competitors Embrace More Open Strategies
The success of DeepSeek has inspired other AI developers to adopt more open approaches. Shortly after DeepSeek gained widespread attention, OpenAI announced that the search functions for its ChatGPT service would be available for free without requiring user sign-up.
Alibaba, a leading Chinese internet company behind the Qwen series of open models, unveiled its latest Qwen2.5-Max model. This model was trained using methods similar to those employed for DeepSeek-V3. Additionally, Alibaba launched a web service allowing users to experience its models at no cost.
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China slams politicization of tech as nations restrict DeepSeek
cgtn.com
