US-based AI developer Anthropic has accused three Chinese competitors – DeepSeek, Moonshot, and MiniMax – of systematically exploiting its chatbot Claude to enhance their own AI models. Anthropic claims these companies created over 24,000 fake accounts to generate more than 16 million interactions with Claude, employing a "distillation" technique to absorb its capabilities. The accusations are particularly severe against DeepSeek, which allegedly used Claude to generate "censorship-compliant answers" on politically sensitive topics, seeking guidance on how to align responses with Chinese censorship requirements. Anthropic, which does not offer its services in China, stated that the Chinese firms used complex proxy server networks to mask their locations.