Opinion

Protecting information

(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-03-13 07:46

Is frequent harassment by junk emails or text messages the price individuals must pay in the information era? Such harassment already seems ubiquitous.

When people repeatedly receive text messages or calls on their mobile phones asking whether their houses are for sale, they wonder how such detailed personal information, including address, name, age and even mobile phone number, has fallen into the hands of strangers.

An investigation published by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences last week reveals appalling abuses of private information by commercial organizations.

The purchase of a house, a car or even registering at a hospital often requires personal information. Even some shopping malls ask for more detailed personal information than they need when customers register to get a discount card.

The trade in private information is now a booming industry.

Some organizations sell details they have obtained to advertising companies, real estate agents, insurance companies or marketers.

Such abuses instill fear in those who like to use online bank accounts to shop. It is quite possible for fraudsters to commit crimes by taking advantage of such information.

Whether an individual has the right to refuse to provide his or her personal information is key to its effective protection.

Everyone in principle has the right to do so.

But if it means a great inconvenience and even being denied access to particular things you need, it will be hard for anyone to refuse.

So the lack of basic legal codes on what kind of personal information organizations are allowed to collect is the primary reason why the abuse of such information is rampant.

In a new amendment to the criminal law adopted by the National People's Congress at the end of last month, trading personal information is classified as a crime under which offenders can be sentenced to imprisonment for up to three years.

If anything, the stipulation only clarifies the nature of such behavior in the form of law, and will hardly make any difference to the illegal trade.

No one who has ever been harassed by text message or junk mail will be able to successfully sue anyone who has sold or revealed his or her personal information, as the victim will never find out who the source was.

Even those whose money is robbed online following an information leak will have difficulty finding out the identity of the culprit.

So this new stipulation is far from enough to effectively stop the abuse of personal information.

Detailed rules may be needed to stop commercial organizations or even government institutions from obtaining unnecessary information and to demand they process the legally collected data confidentially.

(China Daily 03/13/2009 page9)