SEOUL, Feb 6 (Reuters) - South Korea's industry ministry

has temporarily blocked employee access to Chinese artificial

intelligence startup DeepSeek due to security concerns, a

ministry official said on Wednesday, as the government urges

caution on generative AI services.

The government issued a notice on Tuesday calling for

ministries and agencies to exercise caution about using AI

services including DeepSeek and ChatGPT at work, officials said.

State-run Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power said it had blocked

use of AI services including DeepSeek earlier this month.

The defence ministry has also blocked access to DeepSeek on

its computers that are for military use, officials said on

Thursday.

The foreign ministry has restricted access to DeepSeek in

computers that connect to external networks, Yonhap News Agency

said. The ministry said it cannot confirm specific security

measures.

DeepSeek did not immediately respond to an emailed request

for comment.

It was not immediately clear if the ministries had taken any

actions against ChatGPT.

The ban makes South Korea the latest government to warn

about or place restrictions on DeepSeek.

Australia and Taiwan have banned DeepSeek this week from all

government devices over concerns that the Chinese artificial

intelligence startup poses security risks.

Italy's data protection authority ordered DeepSeek in

January to block its chatbot in the country after the Chinese

startup failed to address the regulator's concerns over its

privacy policy.

Some other governments in Europe, the U.S. and India are

also examining implications of using DeepSeek.

South Korea's information privacy watchdog plans to ask

DeepSeek about how the personal information of users is managed.

Chinese startup DeepSeek's launch of its latest AI models

last month sent shockwaves through the tech world. The company

says its models are on a par with or better than products

developed in the United States and are produced at a fraction of

the cost.

South Korean chat app operator Kakao Corp has

told its employees to refrain from using DeepSeek due to

security fears, a spokesperson said on Wednesday, a day after

the company announced its partnership with generative artificial

intelligence heavyweight OpenAI.

Korean tech companies are now being more careful about using

generative AI. SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) , a maker of AI chips, has

restricted access to generative AI services, and allowed limited

use when necessary, a spokesperson said.

Naver, a major South Korean web portal, said it

had asked employees not to use generative AI services that store

data outside the company.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin, Joyce Lee, Hyonhee Shin, Hyunsu Yim,

Ju-min Park, writing by Ju-min Park; Editing by Kate Mayberry,

Alex Richardson, Toby Chopra and Muralikumar Anantharaman)