On March 25, 2022, the first lecture of the 2022 International Law Salon, titled “Cross-border Data Privacy Protection from the Perspective of Trade Law,” was held as scheduled on Tencent Meeting. We were honored to have Prof. Peng Yue, the Vice Dean of the School of Law at Nanjing University, as the keynote speaker, and Prof. Ma Guang as the moderator. More than sixty people participated in the salon online.
Firstly, Prof. Peng introduced the topic from the perspectives of data flow, data privacy, and state intervention. He mentioned the national regulations on cross-border data flows in the United States, the European Union, and China. The United States insists on leveraging market forces to facilitate cross-border data flows, the European Union underscores the necessity of state regulation, and China consistently upholds data sovereignty, highlighting the need for state regulation.
Secondly, regarding the regulatory context of cross-border data protection, which is most closely related to the free flow of data across borders, Prof. Peng introduced the three principles of internet governance.
Finally, Prof. Peng discussed that the data privacy protection provisions in the RCEP, CPTPP, and DEPA will not have a significant impact on China. However, the alternative compliance systems in the CPTPP and DEPA may improperly restrict the extraterritorial effectiveness of China's Personal Information Protection Law.
At the end of the salon, Prof. Ma and several students posed questions to Prof. Peng, such as how to distinguish between data privacy and personal information, how to apply trade exceptions and trade matters, and how to understand the phrase “may be carried out in accordance with its provisions” in Article 38, Paragraph 2 of the Personal Information Protection Law. Prof. Peng patiently answered each question.
