A US government website used an AI search tool from Chinese company Alibaba despite the FBI accusing Alibaba of “malicious” copying of US rival Anthropic’s technology. The Federal Register’s website, run by the National Archives, had the search tool using Alibaba’s Qwen model available on Sept 16, along with other search options; it was unclear when it was deployed. The Qwen-powered search was taken down on Sept 16 around the same time social media posts appeared about it, according to screenshots and an archived version of the site’s source code reviewed by Reuters. The FBI last week accused Alibaba of copying Anthropic’s models to build its own artificial intelligence tools, raising tensions between Washington and Beijing ahead of a meeting next week between the countries’ leaders. US officials said then that Chinese AI companies were engaged in “malicious” copying of US technology on an “industrial scale”. The FBI declined to comment on Sept 17. The National Archives and the White House did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington said the allegations of copying were “unfounded”. AI experts said the use of the Chinese tool may not have posed national security risks but raised questions about whether the federal government was contradicting its own messages about Chinese AI models. Daniel Castro, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, said there was a disconnect between the fierce US-China competition to build superior AI models and a US agency choosing