Six Chinese firms, including TikTok, face EU privacy complaints

16 January 2025 , 16:26

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Six Chinese firms, including TikTok, face EU privacy complaints

TikTok, Shein, Xiaomi (1810.HK), opens new tab and three other Chinese companies were named in a privacy complaint filed on Thursday by Austrian advocacy group Noyb which claimed the firms were unlawfully sending European Union user data to China.

This is reported by Reuters.

Noyb is known for filing complaints against American companies such as Apple (AAPL.O), opens new tab, Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab and Meta (META.O), opens new tab, which has led to several investigations and billions of dollars in fines.

Vienna-based Noyb (None Of Your Business) said, opens new tab this is their first complaint against Chinese firms.

Noyb has filed six complaints in Greece, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Austria for suspension of data transfers to China and is seeking fines that can reach up to 4% of a firm’s global revenue.

Noyb said Alibaba’s (9988.HK), opens new tab e-commerce site AliExpress, retailer Shein, TikTok and phone maker Xiaomi admit to sending Europeans’ personal data to China, citing transparency reports and other documents, while retailer Temu and Tencent’s (0700.HK), opens new tab messenger app WeChat transfer data to undisclosed "third countries" likely China.

A Xiaomi spokesperson said the company was examining the allegations and will fully cooperate with authorities to resolve the matter if they approach the company due to this complaint.

Other companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Under European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) privacy regime, data transfers outside the EU are only allowed if the destination country doesn’t undermine the protection of data.

"Given that China is an authoritarian surveillance state, it is crystal clear that China doesn’t offer the same level of data protection as the EU," said Kleanthi Sardeli, a data protection lawyer at Noyb. "Transferring Europeans’ personal data is clearly unlawful – and must be terminated immediately.

Chinese companies, notably ByteDance-owned TikTok, have been facing off with regulators in various countries. TikTok is planning to shut its app for U.S. users from Sunday, when a federal ban on the social media app is due to come into effect.

The European Commission is also investigating TikTok over its suspected failure to limit election interference, notably in the Romanian presidential vote in November.

David Wilson