WASHINGTON • US President Donald Trump raised questions on Wednesday about plans by China's ByteDance to keep a majority stake in the US operations of popular social media platform TikTok after six Republican lawmakers urged him to reject the proposal.

Mr Trump said he would soon be briefed about a proposal that calls for Oracle Corp to become a "trusted technology provider" for TikTok's US operations, and said he did not favour the idea of having the Chinese firm retain control.

Senator Marco Rubio and five other Republican senators have urged the administration to reject the deal as long as ties remain with Chinese owner ByteDance, and suggested the president could block the proposal.

But ByteDance yesterday said China will need to approve its proposed deal with Oracle, indicating how its bid to stave off a ban in the United States could be further complicated. Mr Trump has threatened to ban the app unless its US operations are sold to a US firm and the US government receives a share of the proceeds.

"I'm not prepared to sign off on anything," he said.

People familiar with the matter were yesterday reported as saying that Oracle will get full access to review TikTok's source code and updates to make sure there are no back doors ByteDance can use to gather data on the app's 100 million American users.

Meanwhile, the Justice Department on Wednesday said WeChat users will not face civil or criminal penalties even if the US bans the Chinese-owned messaging app.

Both WeChat and TikTok are caught up in a proposed sweeping ban due to their "significant threats" to US national security.

REUTERS, BLOOMBERG