[HN Gopher] South Korean regulator accuses DeepSeek of sharing u...
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South Korean regulator accuses DeepSeek of sharing user data with
ByteDance
Author : devonnull
Score : 115 points
Date : 2025-02-18 20:29 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| codydkdc wrote:
| m8 they shared their database with the entire world:
| https://www.wiz.io/blog/wiz-research-uncovers-exposed-deepse...
| observationist wrote:
| "Unintentionally exposed" and "deliberately gave" are two
| meaningfully different actions, both of which are examples of
| why much better regulation and legislation of individuals
| rights over their data are needed.
| tokioyoyo wrote:
| If they sold it, isn't that like what... literally almost every
| single company does nowadays unless you pay up?
| nialv7 wrote:
| *even if you pay up.
| criddell wrote:
| I don't think so. You can't buy user data from Google or
| Facebook or Apple or Microsoft and they probably have more of
| it than anybody else.
| bolognafairy wrote:
| No, but they let you leverage it.
| lolinder wrote:
| Which is in this case a pretty important distinction.
| Letting another company leverage user data within the
| bounding zone which you've defined is not the same thing as
| is being alleged here, which is actually sharing data.
|
| It's quite literally the difference between exposing a
| public API and actually handing over the contents of the
| database.
| tokioyoyo wrote:
| Facebook buys (well at least used to) buy data from other
| brokers. So you can think Bytedance = Facebook, Deepseek
| = data broker in this scenario.
| tiberius_p wrote:
| Lol I'm so glad I'm running it offline with Ollama.
| blackeyeblitzar wrote:
| That won't protect you from its propaganda/censorship. Some
| versions of DeepSeek's models have bias built in - as in it's
| not just implemented by their service/app. But offline does
| protect you from privacy/security issues.
| DyslexicAtheist wrote:
| wait, is this a bad thing for US Tech companies? Guess if that's
| a yes this is good for Europe?
| lelandfe wrote:
| The US decided ByteDance and TikTok were national security
| threats, so presumably this is not a "good thing" from the US's
| perspective.
| DyslexicAtheist wrote:
| again, ... bad for who? For Trump and his Silicon Valley
| sycophants? If that is a yes, then I don't see why this is a
| bad thing for Europe.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| There was data sharing between Twitter, Google and Facebook as
| well.
|
| USA has to make a decision between safety and national security.
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| Sorry how is a story about South Korea about the US?
| itishappy wrote:
| Does DeepSeek only share South Korean data?
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| This is my surprised face -_-
|
| If you're shocked or even the slightest bit surprised, then I
| can't imagine how blissful your life is to be so unaware about
| how much corporations are sharing data with each other.
|
| Like, I wholeheartedly expect that if I mention Beyblade toys on
| Facebook, then the next time I visit Amazon, they'll be
| suggesting Beyblades even if I've never even searched Amazon for
| toys, let alone Beyblade.
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| That's literally Meta's business model, they will happily
| explain how thats going for them in public investors' calls
| every few months.
|
| With deepseek and bytedance things are a lot less clear cut.
| simlevesque wrote:
| The terms of use of Deepseek make it very clear they will
| sell your data.
| baq wrote:
| what is less clear cut? you can safely assume they do _at
| least_ the same things as meta.
| tokioyoyo wrote:
| Bytedance's entire business model is based on user-targeting
| and showing things what they might enjoy watching, so they
| can push more ads to them. I wouldn't be surprised if they
| bought the data to train their own LLMs.
| 4ndrewl wrote:
| How-so less clear-cut? Mysterious and Chinesey so perhaps?
| bolognafairy wrote:
| The ostensible business models of the companies at play.
|
| Stop looking at any opportunity to bark as Sinophobia.
| ryandrake wrote:
| Things can be shocking (as in: causing indignation or disgust),
| yet totally unsurprising. In fact, I'd argue that most
| newsworthy events tend to be both terrible and entirely
| expected, given incentives and the way the world is set up to
| work.
| SecretDreams wrote:
| You could literally talk about beyblade toys on a whatsapp
| video call and you'll be getting Amazon ads for dem blades the
| next day.
| sitkack wrote:
| WhatsApp is secured by Signal encryption
| kelnos wrote:
| WhatsApp is a closed-source client that you cannot trust to
| faithfully and correctly implement the protocol, or be free
| of backdoors that allow Meta to snoop on your
| conversations.
| unclebucknasty wrote:
| > _...corporations are sharing data with each other._
|
| > _I wholeheartedly expect that if I mention Beyblade toys on
| Facebook..._
|
| Isn't the lede here that this isn't just some random data
| sharing agreement between companies, but that these are both
| Chinese companies, and the recipient of the data has been
| banned in the U.S. precisely because of data concerns?
| TheAceOfHearts wrote:
| I recently had an experience that genuinely surprised me: I was
| watching a Peruvian video on YouTube, and I clicked on the
| creator's Instagram profile link in the description. Literally
| a few minutes later I received a promotional email with
| services and investment opportunities from an official Peruvian
| government email. Somehow opening an Instagram profile of a
| Peruvian creator got me tagged as a potential investor? But the
| most shocking part was how _quickly_ this all happened.
| FpUser wrote:
| Here is my story. I needed to buy central console for my car
| (purchased it a while ago in used cars lot). Went to Amazon and
| made my selection. Next thing is I see is the warning: this
| particular console will not fit you car which is MAKE: XXXY,
| MODEL: YYYY, YEAR: ZZZZ. How's that for data sharing.
| linkregister wrote:
| At some point you have entered your car data while searching
| for another car part on Amazon. Amazon caches this information.
| rfoo wrote:
| ... in the same way a lot of website in this world 'shared user
| data' with Google.
|
| Through Google Analytics.
|
| Yeah, believe it or not. ByteDance has a cloud offering. And it
| includes a frontend APM product. And DeepSeek used that. How
| surprising! A Chinese company used a Chinese cloud.
|
| Oh, and chat.deepseek.com resolve to a Huawei Cloud IP address in
| China. It resolves to Cloudflare outside of mainland China, but
| who knows, maybe they just decided to wrap with another CDN and
| their servers are still on Huawei Cloud. So they sent data to
| Huawei, too. I repeat, H-U-A-W-E-I. That cursed telecom equipment
| company in the States.
| kccqzy wrote:
| > These references suggest deep integration with ByteDance's
| analytics and performance monitoring infrastructure
|
| I mean when I visit a random website or open a random app, I kind
| of expect that it will use something like Google Analytics or
| Firebase Crashlytics so that my "user data" is shared with
| Google.
|
| If the article wants me to feel outraged about this practice, I
| don't. I understand that analytics and performance monitoring are
| often outsourced to a third party, often without a choice of
| turning off the analytics and performance monitoring features in
| the first place.
|
| I use the DeepSeek app happily without giving it any data I
| consider private. I have a separate local DeepSeek distilled
| model for that.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Related:
|
| _South Korea bans new DeepSeek AI downloads_
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43076325
| xizst94 wrote:
| Bruhh, your iphone and android will literally "share" what you
| are saying even in private with anyone they can find for
| advertising... so this should not be surprising
| cekanoni wrote:
| Like there is no data sharing between OpenAI and other big tech
| in US....
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| I guess we know how many bots are commenting on this article
| based on how many of them are talking about the US, when the
| article is about South Korea?
| davidcbc wrote:
| Does that make you a bot for not realizing the article also
| talks about US researchers coming to a similar conclusion?
| varenc wrote:
| Some missing context is that the data is shared via the DeepSeek
| app's use of ByteDance analytics/configuration frameworks. So not
| a backroom deal where DeekSeek handed over the chat history for
| its user base, but rather ongoing analytics data being sent from
| the DeepSeek mobile app.
|
| Here's the SecurityScoreCard article that brought attention to
| this: https://securityscorecard.com/blog/a-deep-peek-at-
| deepseek/#...
|
| Besides the usual analytics data (device metadata, user behavior,
| app performance, errors, etc), it's possible raw chat data is
| being shared as well, but it's not a smoking gun.
| unclebucknasty wrote:
| Interesting, but I don't think those details will be
| ameliorative to the people who are concerned (e.g. U.S.
| Congress).
|
| In fact, I wonder if it may further underscore their concerns,
| given that it surfaces the interconnectedness between all of
| these firms.
| nicce wrote:
| So Deepkseek is not sharing more data than most advertising-
| funded apps in the world?
| blackeyeblitzar wrote:
| Reminder on various DeepSeek problems:
|
| 1. DeepSeek is full of propaganda/censorship
| (https://arstechnica.com/ai/2025/01/the-questions-the-chinese...)
|
| 2. They already had a serious security and privacy issue when
| they left their database wide open and leaked everyone's chat
| history (https://www.wiz.io/blog/wiz-research-uncovers-exposed-
| deepse... )
|
| 3. Multiple teams of security researchers found code that links
| DeepSeek to the Chinese government through China Mobile, who is
| banned from operating in the US
| (https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/researchers-link-deepseek...)
|
| 4. Other countries like South Korea are banning DeepSeek already
| over privacy concerns (https://mashable.com/article/south-korea-
| blocks-deepseek)
|
| Trump needs to enforce PAFACA and ban TikTok, but also ban
| DeepSeek, which has the same exact issues since it is also
| effectively operated by a foreign adversary and poses various
| security threats.
| yalogin wrote:
| Shouldn't this be the other way around? TikTok has the most user
| data for any LLM to train with. I bet they will make a killing
| with it, unless of course the CCP decrees that they share it for
| free.
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(page generated 2025-02-18 23:00 UTC)