Protecting personal data

The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature, has released a document stressing the importance of strengthening personal information protection. Strengthening the law to better protect people’s personal information online is a much needed step given that China has the world’s largest population of internet users and the fastest-growing internet economy.

It is now common for people to receive a variety of junk cell phone messages or business promotion calls, which do not inevitably cause serious consequences, but are symptomatic of personal information being misused. And the media reported last year that 300 yuan ($43.50) could buy the information of 50,000 infants born in almost all major hospitals in Shenzhen. All this highlights the urgent need for people’s personal information to be better protected.

The widespread leaking and selling of personal information is not a result of only a few lawbreakers and behind it there exist a huge chain of illegal gains. For the protection of personal information, the punishments extended to those who only lie at one end of the “profit chain” are not enough, and those at the other end need to be caught and punished.

Compared with commercial agencies, government departments master more citizens’ personal information. So, in the country’s strengthened efforts to protect personal information safety, government departments should play an exemplary role and any government employees who leak personal information, either intentional or out of negligence, should be held accountable.

It is expected that after the top legislature’s document calling for efforts in this regard, more supportive policies and regulations will be introduced to strengthen citizens’ information safety protection.