"China rejects allegations of ordering companies to gather data illegally."

"China rejects allegations of ordering companies to gather data illegally."

On Friday, July 11, Beijing denied allegations that it had instructed companies to “illegally” collect and store users’ personal information. This response comes in light of an investigation initiated by an Irish regulator into the Chinese social media giant TikTok, which is part of the European Union’s efforts to enforce data privacy regulations.

Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the foreign ministry, stated during a regular news conference, “The Chinese government places great importance on and safeguards data privacy and security in accordance with the law.”

Mao further emphasized that Beijing “has never and will never require companies or individuals to illegally collect or store data.” She urged the European side to “respect the market economy and fair competition, and to provide a fair, just, and non-discriminatory business environment for companies from all countries.”

TikTok has been under scrutiny from Western governments due to concerns that personal data could be misused by China for espionage or propaganda. The company has consistently denied receiving requests from Chinese authorities for access to data belonging to European users.

In May, TikTok was fined €530 million (approximately $620 million) by the Irish Data Protection Commission for transferring personal data to China, although the company asserted that the data was accessed remotely rather than being physically transferred.

With a global user base of 1.5 billion, TikTok operates as a subsidiary of the Chinese tech conglomerate ByteDance.