Trump says Google may be a ‘national security concern’ and vows to launch probe into China relationship

Donald Trump says Google may be a "national security concern" because of its relationship with China, and suggested he will launch a probe into the company.

"There may or may not be National Security concerns with regard to Google and their relationship with China," he wrote on Twitter.

"If there is a problem, we will find out about it. I sincerely hope there is not!!!"

Google has previously accused of working with China's government, most notably from billionaire investor Peter Thiel.

Despite these claims, Treasury Secretary Steven Munchin said earlier this week that the White House had no concerns about Google's relationship with China.

Last week, Google's vice president of public policy Karan Bhatia appeared in front of a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to face questions about the tech giant's content policies.

During the hearing, Mr Bhatia rejected previous allegations by Mr Thiel that Google had been infiltrated by Chinese intelligence agents.

He also said Google's controversial Project Dragonfly plan to build a censored search engine for China has been "terminated."

Peaking to Republican Senator Josh Hawley, Mr Bhatia said: "Fundamentally in China we actually do very little today, certainly compared to any other major technology company."