China Daily call Trump’s TikTok Oracle-Walmart deal ‘dirty’

Propagandists have hit back at an “unfair” deal that could give two US companies a slice of one of China’s biggest success stories.

China has accused the US of using underhanded tactics to get control over a Chinese company. Picture: Nicolas Asfouri/AFP

China’s state-owned media has branded a deal that will mean TikTok is allowed to keep operating in the US as “dirty”, “unfair” and “based on bullying and extortion”.

The comments appeared in an anonymous editorial published in government mouthpiece China Daily.

“What the United States has done to TikTok is almost the same as a gangster forcing an unreasonable and unfair business deal on a legitimate company,” the unnamed author wrote.

The US has threatened to ban Chinese apps like WeChat and TikTok. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

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As time was running out for TikTok in the US – the biggest market it operates in – President Donald Trump gave his approval to a deal that would give cloud company Oracle and retailer Walmart a combined 20 per cent stake in a newly formed entity called TikTok Global.

The President previously ordered the app sold to a US company or it would be banned in his country.

That order was made in regards to “national security” concerns, which China says “has become the weapon of choice for Washington when it wants to curb the rise of any companies from foreign countries that are outperforming their US peers”.

In the past, China has banned American companies like Facebook and Google from operating there in accordance with the Communist Party’s censorship regime, though both companies have been seemingly desperate to return to China.

But Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg has somewhat cooled on the country after several years of trying and failing to get the social media platform allowed into China.

US President Donald Trump has ben likened to a ‘gangster’. Picture: Mandel Ngan/AFP

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China Daily, which is owned by the Chinese Communist Party’s publicity department, said the country has “no reason to give the green light” to the deal, which it has previously tried to neuter by placing export restrictions on the piece of technology that makes TikTok so successful, but in a twist, China is also arguing the US deal has national security concerns for them.

“Although in theory ByteDance would still own the algorithm that runs TikTok and license it to the new US-based company, Oracle would have the authority to check the source code and any updates,” it said.

“Since TikTok and its Chinese version Douyin have the same source code, it means that the US would get to know the operation of Douyin.”

“ByteDance therefore stands to lose not only control of the company, but also its core technology that it has created and owns.

“That would be detrimental to the long-term development of the company.”

Viral video app TikTok has found itself in the middle of a geopolitical battle. Picture: Greg Baker / AFP

China Daily goes on to accuse the US administration of setting “traps from the very beginning” to force ByteDance to sell to a US company.

“It is not the first time the US has played such dirty tricks to bully foreign companies in order to either destroy them or take them over,” China Daily alleges, warning the US will continue to do the same to other foreign companies if it gets its way on TikTok.