South Korea's industry ministry has temporarily blocked employee access to Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek due to security concerns, a ministry official said on Wednesday, as the government urges caution on generative AI services.

South Korea’s defence ministry has blocked access to the DeepSeek AI tool on military computers due to security concerns. This move adds South Korea to the growing list of countries and companies restricting access to the Chinese AI tool.

The defence and trade ministries cited concerns over data privacy following similar moves by Italy and Australia.

South Korea’s defence, foreign and trade ministries have restricted officials’ access to the service on government computers, Yonhap News reported, citing multiple sources it did not identify.

South Korea's industry ministry has temporarily banned employee access to Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek due to security concerns, a ministry official said on Wednesday, as the government urges caution on generative AI services.

Several countries, including India, the US, and Australia, have banned the Chinese AI chatbot DeepSeek citing security and data privacy concerns. The