The jury is still out on whether the Chinese AI upstart DeepSeek is a game changer or part of an elaborate plan by its hedge fund parent company to short

DeepSeek, a Chinese AI chatbot, swiftly rose to the top of app stores this week, and it's just as swiftly rising in priority for data protection watchdog agencies worldwide.

Italy's data protection authority said on Thursday it had blocked Chinese artificial intelligence model DeepSeek over a lack of information on its use of personal data. DeepSeek could not be accessed on Wednesday in Apple or Google app stores in Italy,