Italy’s data protection authority has blocked use of Chinese tech startup DeepSeek’s AI application to protect Italians’ data and announced an investigation into the companies behind the chatbot.

Italy's data protection authority said on Thursday it had blocked Chinese artificial intelligence model DeepSeek over a lack of information on its use of personal data. DeepSeek could not be accessed on Wednesday in Apple or Google app stores in Italy,

The jury is still out on whether the Chinese AI upstart DeepSeek is a game changer or part of an elaborate plan by its hedge fund parent company to short