The Indian Ministry of Finance has instructed employees to avoid using artificial intelligence tools including ChatGPT and DeepSeek in their work, citing concerns that these tools may pose risks to the confidentiality of government documents and data.
According to Reuters, the Indian Ministry of Finance stated in a memo issued to employees on January 29th that “it has been determined that artificial intelligence tools and apps (such as ChatGPT, DeepSeek, etc.) on office computers and devices pose a risk to the confidentiality of (government) data and documents.”
Three officials from the Ministry of Finance confirmed that the memo is authentic and was circulated internally within the ministry earlier this week.
The disclosure of this news coincides with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s visit to India on Wednesday, February 5th, where he plans to meet with the Indian Minister of Electronics and Information Technology.
OpenAI is facing pressure in India as the company is embroiled in a dispute with major media organizations in the country over copyright issues. The company has stated in court documents that its servers are not located in India, and therefore, Indian courts should not have jurisdiction over the case.
Countries like Australia and Italy have also imposed similar restrictions on the use of DeepSeek. Australia has already banned the use of DeepSeek on government devices citing data security risks.
This information is based on reports from Reuters.