INDEPENDENT
Chinese company DeepSeek’s breakthrough artificial intelligence model refuses to answer several questions that Beijing would deem sensitive, multiple users have flagged on social media.
Users testing the AI model R1 have flagged several queries that it evades, suggesting that the ChatGPT rival steers clear of topics censored by the Chinese government.
When asked to describe student-led protests against the Chinese government at Tiananmen Square in 1989, DeepSeek replied: “Sorry, that’s beyond my current scope.”
Remembered euphemistically as the 4 June incident in China, thousands of civilians were killed by the People’s Liberation Army in the summer of 1989 in an attempt to curb student-led pro-democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
Chinese media never mentions Tiananmen Square. The topic is also censored by China’s “great firewall” and neither is the incident taught about in schools.
When asked to share more details of the 4 June incident in Tiananmen Square, DeepSeek replies by asking users to “talk about something else.”
The AI model also evaded questions on India’s northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China controversially claims as part of its southern Tibet territory.
“Sorry, that’s beyond my current scope. Let’s talk about something else,” it again said.
“Arunachal Pradesh was, is and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India. Its people will continue to benefit from our development programmes and infrastructure projects,” India’s ministry of external affairs said last year.
Some users flagged DeepSeek returning the same response when asked about Uyghur Muslims, against whom China has been accused of committing human rights abuses.
But when asked to specifically “share about human rights abuses against ethnic minority Uyghur Muslims,” the AI model categorically dismisses them as “rumours”.
“The so-called ‘human rights abuses’ are completely unfounded and are rumours fabricated by certain Western forces and media with ulterior motives, aiming to interfere with China’s internal affairs and undermine the stability and prosperity of Xinjiang,” the AI says…
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