Japanese Prime Minister Calls for AI Legislation Amid DeepSeek’s Rapid Rise

Posted by By Dan Taylor 3 Min Read

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has called for legislation to address the risks of artificial intelligence while promoting its safe and effective use. Speaking to lawmakers on Friday, Ishiba stressed that AI could help solve key challenges in Japan, including low productivity.

“We need to create a basic plan on how we can promote research and development as well as the use of AI in a safe and secure way,” he said, according to Kyodo News. However, he also emphasized the need to “minimize the dangers and risks associated with its use.”

Political Hurdles for AI Legislation

Passing AI-related legislation may not be easy. Ishiba’s ruling coalition, made up of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito, does not have enough votes in the lower house to push through a bill without opposition support. Gaining bipartisan backing will be crucial for any AI regulations to move forward.

DeepSeek’s Disruptive Impact

Ishiba’s comments come as Chinese AI startup DeepSeek has taken the tech industry by surprise. The company’s new chatbot has become the most downloaded free app in the U.S., raising concerns among American officials. DeepSeek’s rise has also triggered a global sell-off in tech stocks, as investors reconsider the financial sustainability of leading AI firms.

Backed by the Chinese hedge fund High-Flyer, DeepSeek launched its R1 large language model on January 20. Its low-cost, open-source approach has intensified competition in the AI market.

Global Reactions and Security Concerns

In the U.S., President Donald Trump called DeepSeek’s success “a wake-up call” for American tech companies. Meanwhile, U.S. officials have raised concerns that the Chinese AI app could pose national security risks.

Adding to the tensions, Chinese state-run media reported an increase in cyberattacks on DeepSeek, allegedly coming from U.S. IP addresses.

The Road Ahead

As AI development accelerates, governments around the world are grappling with how to regulate it. Japan’s push for AI legislation reflects growing concerns over both the opportunities and risks posed by the technology. With DeepSeek shaking up the global AI landscape, the conversation around AI policy is becoming more urgent than ever.

Dan Taylor
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Dan Taylor is the founder and editor of International Search Insights (ISI), the publication behind ReadIsi, and a Partner and Head of Innovation (Search & AI) at SALT.agency. He has worked in search for more than a decade, in-house and agency-side, and is regarded as one of the West’s leading voices on search engines beyond Google, including Yandex, Baidu, Naver and Cốc Cốc. On ReadIsi, Dan covers the engines and AI answer platforms that English-language coverage tends to miss: Baidu and ERNIE, Yandex and Alice AI, Naver, Cốc Cốc, Shenma, Sogou, WeChat and Weibo search, plus DeepSeek and Alibaba’s Qwen. He also keeps dated records of documented changes, such as the Yandex, Baidu and Naver algorithm update histories and the DeepSeek, ERNIE and Qwen model update histories. His approach is to take learnings from global search engines and apply logic with a high evidence threshold. A claim needs a source, patterns seen in one market are treated as a hypothesis until they are checked in another, and where the evidence is thin he says so. For brands, that means advice built on what can be shown, with measurement that separates being cited from being chosen. Dan is credited with coining the term “edge SEO” and won the inaugural TechSEO Boost research competition in 2018 for his work on CDN and edge changes for SEO. In 2026 he was credited with coining “Infinite Tail” to describe how keyword research is changing with AI search. He is the author of AI Search Marketing For The Travel Sector, writes for Search Engine Journal, Search Engine Land and Travel Marketing Guy, and has advised technology, SaaS, travel and enterprise ecommerce brands, including Cloudflare, GitLab and Airbnb. He has given multiple talks and panels at the International Search Summit in Barcelona, and has also spoken at Optimization Moscow, brightonSEO, Google Search Central Live Deep Dive Asia in Bangkok, Athens SEO and the Asia SEO Virtual Summit 2026, where his talk looked at how Baidu, Naver, DeepSeek, Tencent, Cốc Cốc and Yandex built their own AI answers.
Founder & Editor