--- title: "If You Think Anyone in the AI Industry Has Any Idea What They’re Doing, It Appears That DeepSeek Just Accidentally Leaked Its Users’ Chats" description: "Seek Within DeepSeek has already changed the AI game in the days since announcing its latest powerful and cheaply-trained open-source model — but that doesn't mean the developers at the Chinese startup are infallible. Researchers at the cloud security company Wiz were poking around the back end of the groundbreaking open-source model's databases when they discovered, \"within minutes,\" that they were able to access a trove of completely unencrypted internal data with ease. \"This database contained a significant volume of chat history, backend data and sensitive information,\" Wiz explained in its vulnerability report, \"including log streams, API Secrets, and operational […]" date: "2025-01-30" modified: "2025-01-30" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/deepseak-leaks-user-chatlogs" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" tags: - "data security" - "deepseek" - "hackers" - "the digest" --- # If You Think Anyone in the AI Industry Has Any Idea What They’re Doing, It Appears That DeepSeek Just Accidentally Leaked Its Users’ Chats ![DeepSeek's databases were left wide-open for anyone to look into its user chatlogs and company infrastructure.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* ## Deep Trouble DeepSeek has [already changed the AI game]() in the days since announcing its latest powerful and cheaply-trained open-source model — but that doesn't mean the developers at the [Chinese startup]() are infallible. Researchers [at the cloud security company]() Wiz were poking around the back end of the groundbreaking open-source model's databases when they discovered, "within minutes," that they were able to access a trove of completely unencrypted internal data with ease. "This database contained a significant volume of chat history, backend data and sensitive information," Wiz [explained in its vulnerability report](), "including log streams, API Secrets, and operational details." Even worse, that wide-open back door at the open-source AI company could easily have led to an attack on DeepSeek's systems "without any authentication or defense mechanism to the outside world," the researchers wrote. As Wiz noted in its report on that glaring vulnerability, DeepSeek immediately took action to secure its databases once the security researchers alerted the company to the exposure. In [conversations with *Wired*](), however, the cloud security firm admitted that it was difficult to get in touch with anyone at DeepSeek, leaving its employees little recourse but to send LinkedIn messages and and emails to every DeepSeek-related account they could find or guess. Nobody at DeepSeek replied to Wiz's attempts at contact, but within an hour the database was locked down, *Wired* reports. In other words, you don't have to be competent to shake the world. ## Open Door Policy The security issue doesn't sound particularly obscure, either. "Usually when we find this kind of exposure, it’s in some neglected service that takes us hours to find — hours of scanning," Wiz vulnerability research head Nir Ohfeld told *Wired*. With Deepseek, he said, those glaring security issues were right "at the front door." When accessing DeepSeek's databases, Wiz researchers found out a lot about the way the company's models operate, including that its infrastructure mimics OpenAI's almost exactly. This level of intelligence about a company that's exploded in popularity is relatively safe in the hands of white-hat hackers. But the researchers told *Wired* that if anyone else got into the DeepSeek databases before they did — an incredibly unchallenging feat, as they indicated repeatedly — they could have made away with as much internal data as they wanted with minimal effort. "The fact that mistakes happen is correct, but this is a dramatic mistake, because the effort level is very low and the access level that we got is very high," Wiz chief technology officer Ami Luttwak told the magazine. "I would say that it means that the service is not mature \[enough\] to be used with any sensitive data at all." **More on DeepSeek:** [*OpenAI Hit With Wave of Mockery for Crying That Someone Stole Its Work Without Permission to Build a Competing Product*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()