DeepSeek reserves its right to collect data from other sources. DeepSeek will receive information from other companies if you create an account with Google or Apple Sign-on. Advertisers can also share information with DeepSeek. This includes “mobile identifiers (for advertising), hashed phone numbers and email addresses, and cookie identifiers that we use to match you and your outside actions.”
DeepSeek uses information
Although a large volume of data from DeepSeek users around the world may be sent to China, the company retains control over how the information is used. DeepSeek’s policy on privacy states that the company will use information in many ways, including to keep its service running, enforce its terms and conditions and make improvements. The company’s privacy policies, however, suggest that it could use user feedback to develop new models. According to its policies, the company will “review and improve” the service by monitoring interactions and usage on all devices, analyzing user behavior, and training and improving their technology. DeepSeek’s policy on privacy also states that the company will use information in order to “comply [its] with legal obligations”. This is a clause that many companies include as part of their policies. DeepSeek’s policy on privacy states that data can be accessed and shared by its “corporate groups” and with law enforcement agencies and public authorities when required.
All companies have legal obligations. However, those in China have a special responsibility. Over the last decade, Chinese officials passed a series of cybersecurity laws and that allow state officials to request data from tech firms. One law from 2017 says that citizens and organizations should “cooperate” with national intelligence efforts.
These new laws, along with growing trade tensions between China and the US, and other geopolitical issues, have fueled security concerns about TikTok. Some of those who argued for the TikTok banning argued that the app could collect huge amounts of data, and then send it back to China. It could also be used by Chinese propaganda. (TikTok denies that it sends US user data to China’s government. DeepSeek users have also pointed out that it does not answer questions about the 1989 Tiananmen massacre and that some of the answers sound like propaganda. Willemsen,
says that compared to users of social media platforms like TikTok the people messaging using a generative AI are more engaged and content can feel more personalized. Any influence could be greater. “Risks… of subliminal content, conversation direction steering and active engagement should lead to greater concern, not lesser,” he says. “Especially given that the inner workings are widely unknown and that its thresholds and borders, controls, censorship and intent/personae are largely left uninspected, and that it is already so popular at its infancy.” Olejnik: “We cannot rule out that 2025 could bring an expansion – direct action against AI companies.” “Of Course, data collection will again be cited as the reason.”
Added details about DeepSeek’s activity at 5:27 pm on January 27, 2025.
