BEIJING (Reuters) - The Chinese government "has never and will never" require companies or individuals to collect data for or provide data to it in a way that violates the law, China's foreign ministry said on Friday.

The ministry spoksperson was responding to a question about six Chinese companies including TikTok, Shein, Xiaomi (OTC: XIACF ), which have been named in a privacy complaint filed by Austrian advocacy group Noyb claiming the firms were unlawfully sending European Union user data to China.