One Australian business has discouraged staff from using the technology, others are scrambling for advice on its cybersecurity implications - while federal government ministers are urging caution.
But others have actually invited DeepSeek's arrival, calling for Australia to follow China's lead in establishing powerful yet less energy-intensive AI technology.
In the days because the Chinese company launched its R1 expert system model and publicly launched its chatbot and app, it has upended the AI industry.
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Several global industry leaders saw their market values drop after the launch, as DeepSeek showed AI might be developed utilizing a portion of the cost and processing needed to train models such as ChatGPT or Meta's Llama.
Its arrival might signify a brand-new industry shift, but for federal government and company, the result is uncertain. Whereas ChatGPT's 2022 arrival caught federal governments and organizations by surprise as staff started to try the brand-new AI innovation, at least for the arrival of Deepseek, some had a playbook.
Business as usual
A spokesperson for Telstra stated the business had "a strenuous process to assess all AI tools, abilities, and use cases in our service", consisting of a list of authorized generative AI tools, and standards on how to utilize them.
For now at Telstra, DeepSeek is not approved and its use is not motivated (although it's not officially obstructed).
"Our favored partner is MS Copilot, and we're rolling out 21,000 Copilot for Microsoft 365 licences to our staff members."
Other business sought immediate advice on whether DeepSeek ought to be embraced.
Major Australian cybersecurity company CyberCX's executive director of cyber intelligence, Katherine Mansted, said customers had currently approached the business for recommendations on whether the innovation was safe.
"That's no surprise, due to the fact that it seems the entire world has been in a little bit of a DeepSeek craze - both the economically and market likely and those with the security lens," Mansted said.
DeepSeek and federal government
CyberCX this week took the unusual step of rapidly issuing suggestions advising organisations, including government departments and those keeping sensitive info, highly consider restricting access to DeepSeek on work devices.
"We understand that there is no proactive policy here from federal government ... We've been down this road in the past," Mansted stated. "We've had debates about TikTok, about Chinese monitoring cams, about Huawei in the telco network, and we constantly act after the reality, not before the fact ... Here, especially due to the fact that the risks are around compromise of delicate information, in terms of any info that you put into this AI assistant: it's going straight to China.
"We believed we needed to act faster this time."
Under federal AI policy implemented in September 2024, agencies have up until completion of February 2025 to release openness files about their use of AI.
But understanding who makes decisions on the particular use of DeepSeek in the federal government has shown challenging. The attorney general's department, which made the decision to prohibit TikTok utilize on government devices, referred inquiries to the Digital Transformation Agency, which in turn referred enquires to the Department of Home Affairs.
Home Affairs was asked on Thursday for its official policy and did not supply a reaction by the time of publication.
Familiar debates ...
Some of the reaction in Australia to DeepSeek is by now familiar. There have been calls to prohibit the innovation, amidst concern over how the Chinese government might access user data - an echo of the days Huawei was banned from the NBN and 5G rollouts in Australia, and more just recently, of the argument over prohibiting TikTok.
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a strong critic of the China federal government, said this week that Australia "can not continue the present technique of reacting to each new tech development". It called for a tech technique covering AI that included investing in sovereign AI capabilities.
The market minister, Ed Husic, stated on Tuesday it was too early to make a decision on whether DeepSeek was a security threat.
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"If there is anything that presents a risk in the interest, asteroidsathome.net we will always keep an open mind and enjoy what happens. I think it's prematurely to leap to conclusions on that," he stated. "But, again, if we have to act, then responsible governments do."
He worried that Australia is "in the lasts" of preparing its action and would establish its own regulative settings.
"The US is flagging their approach. The EU has theirs. Canada also will have a different method. And our regional partners as well are taking a look at this," he said.
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As DeepSeek Upends the aI Industry, one Group is Urging Australia to Embrace The Opportunity
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