Brad Smith, Vice Chairman and President of Microsoft, stated during a Senate hearing today that Microsoft employees are prohibited from using DeepSeek due to concerns about data security and propaganda.
"At Microsoft, we do not allow our employees to use the DeepSeek app," Smith said, referring to DeepSeek's application services available on both desktop and mobile platforms.
Smith also mentioned that, due to these concerns, Microsoft has not included DeepSeek in its app store.
Although many organizations and even countries have imposed restrictions on DeepSeek, this marks the first time Microsoft has publicly announced such a ban.
According to Smith, the decision stems from risks associated with data being stored on servers in China, as well as potential influences from "Chinese propaganda" in DeepSeek's responses.
DeepSeek’s privacy policy states that user data is stored on servers located in China. This data is subject to Chinese laws, which mandate cooperation with the country's intelligence agencies. Additionally, DeepSeek rigorously censors topics deemed sensitive by the Chinese government.
Despite Smith's criticisms of DeepSeek, Microsoft began offering the company's R1 model on its Azure cloud service earlier this year, shortly after it gained popularity.
However, this differs somewhat from providing the DeepSeek chatbot application itself. Since DeepSeek is open-source, anyone can download the model, host it on their own servers, and offer it to customers without sending data back to China.
Nevertheless, this does not eliminate other risks, such as the model spreading propaganda or generating unsafe code.
During the Senate hearing, Smith noted that Microsoft had managed to access DeepSeek’s AI model and "modify" it to remove "harmful side effects." Without detailing the specific changes made to the DeepSeek model, Microsoft referenced TechCrunch’s coverage of Smith’s remarks.
When DeepSeek was initially launched on Azure, Microsoft stated that it had undergone "rigorous red teaming and safety evaluations" before being hosted on Azure.
While it is worth noting that DeepSeek’s app is also a direct competitor to Microsoft’s own Copilot internet search chat application, Microsoft has not banned all such competing chat apps from its Windows app store.
