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Hong Kong has defended bringing in changes to its privacy rules, which a technology business body has raised a number of worries about.
The new rules target “doxxing”, which is a destructive act the place people’s individual details is released on-line. This is a tactic utilized throughout the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong during 2019 the place government supporters sought to recognize masked protestors, though protestors themselves reportedly shared non-public data about police officers and their family members, as reported by the Guardian.
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Hong Kong’s Privacy Commissioner for Individual Details (PCPD) reaffirmed that the laws will only concern “unlawful” doxxing acts and the PCPD’s relevant enforcement powers.
“The scope of the doxxing offence will be clearly set out in the Amendments. The PCPD strongly rebuts any suggestion that the Amendments may well in any way have an impact on international expenditure in Hong Kong,” it claimed in a assertion.
The proposed laws has been met with some resistance from the Asia Internet Coalition (AIC), an market affiliation of major internet and tech providers in the Asia Pacific location with an aim to boost the knowing and resolution of Internet and ICT policy issues. Primarily based in Singapore, AIC counts on Huge Tech providers between its members, these types of as Apple, Facebook, Google, Amazon and SAP.
In a letter sent to the PCPD on June 25, and built public this 7 days, AIC proven a quantity of proposed amendments to the law, stating that the proposed laws was much too broad.
AIC claimed that as on the web services are provided by offshore world-wide or regional headquarter corporations, nearby workers of abroad platforms “are not liable for the operations of the platforms neither do they (or the neighborhood subsidiary by which they are utilized) have obtain right or manage to administer the on the web system contents”.
It reported that any rectification see “may only be legitimately issued in opposition to the genuine running entity of the on the net providers system exterior of Hong Kong, and it would be a fallacy to issue the similar against their community subsidiaries or entities, or to keep them or their staff members legally liable for the very same.”
AIC went on to underline that the only way for tech organizations to prevent these sanctions would be to refrain from investing and featuring their expert services in Hong Kong, which could deprive corporations and individuals and generate new limitations to trade.
“Thus, the possibility of prosecuting subsidiary staff will make uncertainties for businesses and have an impact on Hong Kong’s enhancement as an innovation and technology hub. If it continues to be the PCPD or the Administration’s intention to keep the staff of the neighborhood subsidiaries or entities liable for doxxing information, we request clarification on the lawful foundation of undertaking so.”
The PCPD has stated it is welcoming views from stakeholders and will meet with reps of the AIC to “better understand their views”.
Some components of this post are sourced from:
www.itpro.co.uk