TikTok-Oracle ‘Trusted Technology Partner’ Deal to Happen

As the recent Reuters report states, TikTok and Oracle are about to sign a deal that will allow the second to transfer US users’ data to US-based servers. Due to this change, the data won’t be available to the Chinese ByteDance company anymore. Besides, the data will be protected by US-based cyber security workers without any supervision from the parent company. 

“Project Texas”

The “Trusted Technology Partner’ deal is internally called “Project Texas” as Oracle’s headquarters are based in Austin, TX. Oracle will restrict data controls in the US and will later recreate the same system for EU customers. However, it’s not clear what exact control level will be granted to Chinese

TikTok managers. 

The development of the agreement started when President Trump demanded to ban TikTok in the US to prevent the Chinese government from accessing US user data. Now Oracle is about to become a trusted tech partner of the social network, while the mother company will be formally divested from its US TikTok data operations. The agreement would likely take place in the near future even though TikTok appealed to Trump’s orders and proved that Trump overstepped its authority. Still, we don’t know under what orders the data transfer will be conducted. Most probably, ByteDance will still have a certain level of access to the data, but the Chinese government won’t be able to request access due to the new server location. 

To Be Continued

Right now, both TikTok and Oracle don’t publish any further comments, which is a sign that the agreement is not ready yet. Still, if Reuters published data from trusted sources, we will hear from the companies soon. What do you think about the current agreement? Will it improve US users’ safety on the platform? You can reply in the comments and share the news on social media.