The Risks of Deepseek: the data it collects, its use and storage and the cyberbasings

The artificial intelligence (Take) by DeepSeek He leads the download lists in APP Store and Google Play Store, a position that maintains its rising popularity but obvious the risks in safety and privacy that it can present for users.

“The appearance of new companies and Deepseek presents both opportunities and security concerns for users,” says cybersecurity expert in Nordvpn, Adrianus Warmenhoven, who urges AA to interact with this type of platforms with a certain “degree of caution.”

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In motive, it is found in the differences presented by the laws on privacy in the different countries. “Deepseek, being a Chinese AI startup, operates in a regulatory environment in which the governmental supervision of the data is strict. This raises potential risks in relation to the collection, storage and use of data, ”he explains.

The application offers an AI assistant, a ‘chatbot’, which can be downloaded for free in the App Store and Google Play Store, and that responds to the user’s doubts in the form of conversation. To do this, it also has access to the web, and even has a deep way of thinking that, although it takes a few more seconds, offers more conscientious responses.

One of the main problems that have been detected is the possible partiality of the model, which “has already faced a growing negative reaction for its refusal to address political issues”, which makes it suspect “possible biases and external influences in policies in the policies of moderation of contents of the platform, ”says Warmenhoven.

With regard to privacy policy, this is located on the official Deepseek website, in English, and indicates that it collects personal information of both the profile and the information that the user shares with the AI ​​(not only of the history of Conversations, but also photos, videos and audio that loads), as well as the one that facilitates when contacting the company itself.

Also information from the device from which the user uses the application, such as “device model, operating system, patterns or rhythms of key pulsations, IP address and system language”, and the network in which it is connected. To this are added the data of the use of the ‘app’, of the ‘cookies’ and of the payment information, and those from sources such as the linked services or of advertisers.

These data are stored in China. “This generates concern, not only for the collection of data described, but also for the potential risks associated with the storage of said data in a jurisdiction with different privacy and security standards,” adds the cybersecurity expert.

In this context, Warmenhoven advises users to be aware that “any data shared with the platform could be subject to government access under the cybersecurity laws of China, which require companies to provide access to the data when requesting it by the authorities”.

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The lack of transparency about the artificial intelligence models that the company has developed, since there is a lack of information about training and the way they work.

Therefore, the expert warns that “users should consider whether their interactions or charged data could inadvertently contribute to automatic learning processes, which could lead to the improper use of data or the development of tools that could be exploited in a malicious way ”

Warmenhoven also refers the risks of suffering cyber attacks, for the attention that this application is attracting, and not only among users. In fact, this Monday, the company itself announced that it limited registrations due to a cyber attack, which did not give more details.

“As IA platforms become more sophisticated, they also become main objectives for computer pirates seeking to exploit user data or AI own,” says Nordvpn expert.

Warmenhoven concludes that “to mitigate these risks, users must adopt a proactive approach to cybersecurity”, which includes “examining the terms and conditions of any platform with which they interact, understand where their data is stored and who has access to they”.