But the story of DeepSeek also reveals just how much Chinese technological development continues to depend on the United States. DeepSeek used chips from the U.S. giant Nvidia to create its model, and, as it turns out, may have also tapped American data to train it. Washington can capitalize on that advantage to choke off Chinese tech firms.

The Hang Seng Tech Index, which tracks the 30 largest technology companies listed in the city, rose as much as 2.9% on Friday, reflecting a rise of more than 20% from its January low.

China’s growing clout in the artificial intelligence space has sparked a wave of optimism toward the nation’s tech shares, with a gauge entering a bull market and brokers issuing upbeat calls.

DeepSeek AI app for iPhone and Android has been caught sending unencrypted data to servers in China. You'd best avoid the mobile apps.

Chart-topping AI iPhone app DeepSeek has been found to be sending data to Chinese-owned services, as well as collecting extensive user data that is held and sent unencrypted.

Multiple security flaws have been found in the DeepSeek iOS app, which is still one of the most popular downloads in the App Store after topping the charts when it first launched. The latest findings are far worse than the previous security failure which exposed chat history and other sensitive information in a database requiring no authentication