It never seems to end: Facebook Inc. is facing yet another storm of criticism regarding data sharing after news broke Tuesday that the company had data-sharing partnerships with about 60 device makers, including one Chinese firm flagged as a possible threat by U.S. intelligence.

That firm is Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., which according to intelligence chiefs has close ties to the Chinese government and could be involved in espionage against the U.S. Moreover, in April the U.S. Justice Department began investigating the Chinese smartphone giant for potential violations of sanctions on Iran.

The data-sharing relationships began in 2010, and also included Chinese firms Lenovo Group Ltd., Oppo Electronics Corp. and TCL Communication Technology Holdings Ltd. The partnerships are ongoing, although according to the New York Times, Facebook will soon break off the deal with Huawei.

According to the Times, such deals with device makers were started as early as 2007 prior to standalone apps working well on phones, and this allowed phone makers to implement Facebook features such as “like” buttons, address books and status updates.

This was no different to what was offered to smartphone giants such as Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Inc. as well as many other device makers, but the fact that a Chinese company allegedly involved in espionage was involved has raised eyebrows. It also turns out that the user data collected could be related to relationships, political leanings and education status.

Republican Senator John Thune has demanded that Facebook explain to Congress the full extent of these partnerships. “Facebook is learning hard lessons that meaningful transparency is a high standard to meet,” he said.

In a statement, Senator Mark Warner said it’s no secret that Huawei has been under the spotlight, since in 2012 it was said the company was perhaps a little too close to the Chinese government. “The news that Facebook provided privileged access to Facebook’s API to Chinese device makers like Huawei and TCL raises legitimate concerns, and I look forward to learning more about how Facebook ensured that information about their users was not sent to Chinese servers,” said Warner.

“Facebook’s integrations with Huawei, Lenovo, OPPO and TCL were controlled from the get go — and we approved the Facebook experiences these companies built,” Francisco Varela, Facebook’s vice president of mobile partnerships, said in a statement. “Given the interest from Congress, we wanted to make clear that all the information from these integrations with Huawei was stored on the device, not on Huawei’s servers.”

Image: Jason Howie via Flickr