China’s Ministry of Commerce rejected U.S. accusations that some Chinese AI firms are conducting “industrial-scale distillation” of American AI models, describing Washington’s latest move as an attempt to politicize a “normal technical and commercial issue.” #🇨🇳 ChinA.I. 🤖🧠🦾🤖
“China’s open-source models are shared with global companies, including US companies, facilitating the development of related models. Reports from US companies on their model development also reveal that they extensively distill Chinese models,” the ministry’s spokesperson said in a statement on Wednesday. “Conversely, the US has repeatedly and unilaterally accused Chinese companies of engaging in ’industrial-scale’ distillation, smearing common industry practices as attacks. This reflects both the US’s anxiety and its double standards,” the statement added.
Earlier this week, the U.S. government accused six Chinese AI firms—DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, Alibaba Group, MiniMax, StepFun and Z.ai.—of using industrial-scale distillation to copy the capabilities of American models.
Beijing’s response to the U.S. accusations comes ahead of a scheduled meeting in Washington later this month between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The two heads of state are expected to discuss AI among other topics.
Distillation, a normal technique used in AI training, has become a sensitive and highly controversial topic due to the intensifying tech rivalry between the U.S. and China. As Chinese models have become more powerful, Trump administration officials have stepped up their criticism of Chinese firms for alleged distillation attacks. This year, Anthropic has accused several Chinese firms of engaging in illicit distillation of Claude models.
https://www.globaltimes.c..
