UPDATE 1-Senator Rubio urges Trump to scrap TikTok-Oracle deal if Bytedance ties remain

WASHINGTON, Sept 16- Republican Senator Marco Rubio called on the Trump administration to reject a proposed deal for Oracle to become a “trusted technology provider” for popular social media platform TikTok’s U.S. operations if ties to current Chinese owner Bytedance remain. Marco Rubio, the first senator to call on the administration to investigate TikTok,…

WASHINGTON, Sept 16 (Reuters) – Republican Senator Marco

Rubio called on the Trump administration to reject a proposed

deal for Oracle to become a “trusted technology

provider” for popular social media platform TikTok’s U.S.

operations if ties to current Chinese owner Bytedance remain.

Marco Rubio, the first senator to call on the administrationto investigate TikTok, said in the letter to President DonaldTrump that “serious questions” remained about Oracle’s role, thetechnology it would provide to Bytedance, and the future of theapplication’s algorithm.

“We remain opposed to any deal that would allow China-basedor controlled entities to retain, control or modify the code oralgorithms that operate any U.S.-based version of TikTok,” Rubiowrote in the letter, dated Wednesday.

“We are heartened that this deal still requires governmentapproval, and if reports indicating this proposed deal willretain links to ByteDance or other Chinese-controlled entities,we strongly urge the administration to reject such a proposal onnational security grounds,” he added.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request forcomment.(Reporting by Alexandra AlperEditing by Chizu Nomiyama and Nick Zieminski)