(Reuters) - A group of seven Republican U.S. senators on Tuesday asked the Commerce Department to evaluate potential data security vulnerabilities posed by Chinese open-source AI models like DeepSeek.

The senators including Jon Husted, Ted Budd and John Cornyn want the Commerce Department to detail any threats from data collected by applications being fed back to Chinese servers or whether the AI models are feeding American personal or enterprise data to China's military or to companies with Chinese military ties. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said in January it appeared DeepSeek had misappropriated U.S. AI technology and vowed to impose restrictions.