DHS orders DeepSeek removed from federal civilian IT systems

The US Department of Homeland Security ordered civilian federal agencies on October 19 to remove DeepSeek products, along with third-party services built on the Chinese AI model, from government IT systems.

The notice also bars civilian agencies from buying DeepSeek products or third-party services developed using DeepSeek, according to Reuters' account of the document published that day.

DHS cited “multiple threat vectors.” It said use of the product “may result in the transfer of sensitive data to the PRC if used by US government employees or vendors,” and warned that agency use “could produce actionable intelligence on US persons and/or government agencies.” The models themselves, it added, “may contain malware or other security vulnerabilities.”

The order was not improvised. In a July memo, DHS had already told federal agencies to monitor traffic flowing in and out of government websites to address potential DeepSeek-related risk; that memo was made public on October 19 as well.

Several agencies had moved first: the Commerce Department and the Navy banned DeepSeek on government devices, and states including New York, Tennessee and Virginia took similar steps. The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately comment.

The move is part of a broader push by the Trump administration against Chinese technology companies. Reuters reports that the Federal Communications Commission will vote on October 29 to bar Chinese labs from testing electronics — smartphones, cameras, computers — destined for the US market, a category in which 82% of US electronics were tested in China in 2025.

The signal for the AI industry is that model-level scrutiny is moving from device bans toward procurement and supply-chain exclusion. Vendors selling AI services to US civilian agencies must now trace whether DeepSeek sits anywhere in their stack, not just whether an employee installed the app.

What to watch next: compliance deadlines and enforcement guidance for agencies, whether the Defense Department and its contractors extend similar rules, and the outcome of the October 29 FCC vote, which could widen restrictions across Chinese AI and hardware supply chains.