Department of Homeland Security publishes a DeepSeek removal order

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) filed a notice for public inspection on 19 October 2026, document 2026-21447, scheduled for the Federal Register on 20 October 2026. The notice says the Secretary has ordered two steps under the Federal Acquisition Supply Chain Security Act of 2018.

The first excludes information technology products and services developed by Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Co., Ltd, including affiliated entities, from federal civilian agency procurements. The second removes DeepSeek and DeepSeek-affiliate products, and third-party products and services developed using DeepSeek implementations, from civilian agency information technology.

The signed order in the appendix is Exclusion and Removal Order #2026-01. Its original release date is 24 July 2026, and it is signed by Secretary Markwayne Mullin. It applies to federal civilian executive branch agencies, except their national security systems and secure compartmented information systems. Those agencies are told to exclude the covered products from procurements, including product lists and similar buying tools, effective immediately after the order was issued, and to remove covered products from agency IT or seek an exception.

Exception requests go to the issuing official in writing within 60 days of the July issuance, so the October notice does not start a new clock. The notice names Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Co., Ltd, while the signed order names Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Basic Technology Research Co., Ltd. The order does not, on its own terms, cover the Department of Defense or the intelligence community, except where those departments’ own authorities do not apply.