South Korea says DeepSeek transferred user data to China and the U.S. without consent

South Korea's data protection authority has concluded that Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek collected personal information from local users and transferred it overseas without their permission. The authority, the Personal Information Protection Commission, released its written findings on Thursday in connection with a privacy and security review of DeepSeek. It follows DeepSeek's removal of its chatbot application from South Korean app stores in February at the recommendation of PICP. The agency said DeepSeek had committed to cooperate on its concerns. During DeepSeek's presence in South Korea, it transferred user data to several firms in China and the U.S. without obtaining the necessary consent from users or disclosing the practice, the PIPC said. The agency highlighted a particular case in which DeepSeek transferred information from user-written AI prompts, as well as device, network, and app information, to a Chinese cloud service platform named Beijing Volcano ... Read full article.