South Korea bans DeepSeek’s artificial intelligence chatbot from local app stores

South Korea has become the latest country to ban DeepSeek’s artificial intelligence chatbot from local app stores, pending a review of how the Chinese company handles user data.

South Korea’s data protection watchdog said DeepSeek and its R1 chatbot had been removed from local versions of Google Play and Apple App Store and it would become available when “improvements and remedies” were made to ensure compliance with personal data protection laws.