Trump administration bars DeepSeek from civilian agency IT systems
The ban blocks federal civilian agencies from running DeepSeek software or buying products built on it, widening US scrutiny of Chinese AI vendors.
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The Trump administration is removing DeepSeek, the Chinese artificial-intelligence company, from civilian government agency computer systems. Agencies will also be barred from buying products built on DeepSeek's technology.
The move follows a $400 million funding round that DeepSeek led for a robotics venture earlier this month, and comes weeks after Chinese regulators opened their own inquiry into whether the company routed user data to Anthropic, the US AI firm. A court has separately upheld a decision naming Anthropic a supply-chain risk, a sign that both US and Chinese AI vendors are facing national-security scrutiny in Washington.
The procurement ban applies only to civilian agencies, but it sets down a formal marker of distrust at a time when other parts of the US-China relationship have shown signs of easing. The USDA reported this month that China resumed soybean purchases after a quiet stretch, and CNBC reported that US regulators are weighing wider China market access for Mastercard and Citi, after Visa was cleared to begin building a card-clearing business there.