China will take resolute countermeasures if the United States takes actions to suppress Chinese artificial intelligence companies under the pretext of combating model distillation, the Ministry of Commerce said late Wednesday.
The ministry's comments came in response to allegations by US government agencies that "Chinese AI companies systematically mined US models" to train their own systems, a technical process known as model distillation.
A ministry spokesperson said in a statement that the accusations are groundless and legally unsound, calling them a politicization of a normal technical and commercial practice.
The commerce official said that model distillation is a common practice through which AI models learn from one another and is widely used by companies around the world, including US firms.
The technology can improve learning efficiency and facilitate more effective use of human knowledge, contributing to the development of the AI industry and helping make its benefits more broadly accessible, particularly to developing countries, the spokesperson added.
