CRI听力:Shenzhen to Issue First Regulation on Personal Information Protection

The southern Chinese city of Shenzhen is drafting a regulation protecting personal information, the first of its kind in the country.

The regulation has aroused heated discussion over whether personal information should be publicly available, especially on the Internet.

CRI's Yingying has more.



Anonymous text messages, phone calls from salesmen and spam - the leaking of personal information is an increasing public annoyance.

Feng Jiang is a member of the Shenzhen Lawyers' Association, and is working on the city's draft regulation.

He says these phenomena can hardly be stopped because there's no powerful, clear law regarding the use of personal information.

"Some regulations and laws, like the law on resident identity cards or prevention and treatment of infectious diseases, contain specific items on personal information protection. Sometimes information holders in different industries are bound to not leak certain information. Also the Civil Law and our constitution clearly state that personal information should be protected."

Feng Jiang says the new rule will regulate the collection, storage, modification, transfer, publication and use of personal information within the municipal jurisdiction.

The prospect has aroused public attention because it might prohibit a phenomenon among Chinese netizens known as "human flesh searches," where details of people's private lives are crowd-sourced and revealed online.

Feng Jiang gives his explanation.

"Human flesh searches" can be either an important force in punishing evil and promoting good, or detrimental to people's lives due to leaked personal information. But they are only one special case among widespread use of personal information in society. So I think the rule still needs to focus on the overall benefits of regulating the publication of personal information."

But Liu Deliang, a cyber law expert, disagrees.

He says there is a public misunderstanding of privacy and how it's protected by law.

"Personal information can be divided into private information and other information. Privacy refers to information that relates to an individual's dignity or social moral standards. The leak of this information is harmful to individuals. Other information, including name, telephone number and address, is used to socialize with others and the public has the right to know."

Liu Deliang says the law should focus more on how social information is misused, especially for economic gain.

"It should be clearly stated that the business value of personal information is a kind of individual property in our civil law. It's easier for victims to sue people who misuse this information and seek compensation than to find out who gave it away, given the fact that nowadays we have to register our information everywhere."

As such, Feng Jiang of the Shenzhen Lawyers' Association says the regulation requires the cooperation of various government departments, and drafting could take a long period of time.

For CRI, this is Yingying.