Overview
- The Department of Homeland Security directed civilian federal agencies to stop using DeepSeek products, pull affected items from procurement catalogs, and halt new purchases while allowing agencies to seek narrow written exemptions through CISA within 60 days.
- Officials pointed to technical findings that include NowSecure’s reported vulnerabilities in DeepSeek’s iOS app and flagged data collection practices like account registration, device fingerprinting, and prompt handling that could leak sensitive information.
- The directive applies only to civilian agencies and procurement systems and explicitly excludes military and intelligence acquisitions and private personal installations.
- DHS recommended interim steps such as enhanced logging and network monitoring while agencies remove covered items, acknowledged practical limits in identifying third‑party or privately hosted model uses, and will review the exclusion annually.
- The action rests on supply‑chain authority under FASCSA and cites Chinese laws that can compel corporate data access, a rationale that has drawn objections from Beijing and could reshape federal vendor choices and contracting decisions.