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Vicky Liu

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Vicky Liu is a legal consultant in the Beijing office of Covington & Burling LLP. She is a member of the firm’s data privacy and cybersecurity practice. Ms. Liu received her JD from Emory University School of Law and her B.A, magna cum laude from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

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On April 11, 2023, the Cyberspace Administration of China (“CAC”) released draft Administrative Measures for Generative Artificial Intelligence Services (《生成式人工智能服务管理办法（征求意见稿）》) (“draft Measures”) (official Chinese version available here) for public consultation.  The deadline for submitting comments is May 10, 2023.

The draft Measures would regulate generative Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) services that are “provided to the public in mainland China.”  These requirements cover a wide range of issues that are frequently debated in relation to the governance of generative AI globally, such as data protection, non-discrimination, bias and the quality of training data.  The draft Measures also highlight issues arising from the use of generative AI that are of particular concern to the Chinese government, such as content moderation, the completion of a security assessment for new technologies, and algorithmic transparency.  The draft Measures thus reflect the Chinese government’s objective to craft its own governance model for new technologies such as generative AI.

Further, and notwithstanding the requirements introduced by the draft Measures (as described in greater detail below), the text states that the government encourages the (indigenous) development of (and international cooperation in relation to) generative AI technology, and encourages companies to adopt “secure and trustworthy software, tools, computing and data resources” to that end. 

Notably, the draft Measures do not make a distinction between generative AI services offered to individual consumers or enterprise customers, although certain requirements appear to be more directed to consumer-facing services than enterprise services.

This blog post identifies a few highlights of the draft Measures.…

Continue Reading China Proposes Draft Measures to Regulate Generative AI

On February 24, 2023, the Cyberspace Administration of China (“CAC”) released the final version of the Measures on the Standard Contract for the Cross-border Transfer of Personal Information (“Measures”) (only available in Chinese here), including a template contract (“Standard Contract”) accompanying the Measures.  The Measures will take effect on June 1, 2023, but are subject to a 6-month grace period to allow companies time to bring their activities into compliance.

The finalization of the Measures marks another important step forward in the establishment of China’s cross-border data transfer framework.  With implementing rules for all three lawful transfer mechanisms now in place, China appears to be entering into a new phase where cross-border transfer activities will be more closely regulated and enforcement actions are more likely to arise for non-compliance. …

Continue Reading China Finalizes Standard Contract for Cross-Border Transfers of Personal Information

On August 31, 2022, one day before the Measures for Security Assessment of Cross-border Data Transfer (“Measures”) were scheduled to take effect, the Cyberspace Administration of China (“CAC”) released a first edition of its guidance on how organizations should complete the security assessment application (“CAC Guidance”). Covington’s previous posts on the Measures can be found here.…

Continue Reading China Releases Guidance on Cross-border Data Transfer Security Assessment Application

In January 2022, China released two regulations (one in draft form) that touch on hot topics in technological development – algorithmic recommendations and deep synthesis – making it one of the first countries in the world to directly tackle these cutting edge areas.  In this post, we provide an overview of the draft Provisions on…

On July 2 and July 5, 2021, China’s Cybersecurity Review Office (“CRO”), an office established under the Cyberspace Administration of China (“CAC”) responsible for coordinating the implementation of China’s Cybersecurity Review framework (more details about this framework can be found in our previous blogpost, available here), announced that it had initiated cybersecurity reviews against four mobile applications operated by three Chinese companies:  Didi Chuxing (“Didi”), Yunmanman, Huochebang and BOSS Zhipin (announcements are available here and here).

According to CRO’s announcements, these cybersecurity reviews were initiated based on requirements under the National Security Law (“NSL”), the Cybersecurity Law (“CSL”) and the Measures on Cybersecurity Review (“Measures”) and are aimed at “preventing national data security risks, maintaining national security and safeguarding public interests.”  This is the first time that CRO publically announced the initiation of cybersecurity reviews against companies after the Measures took effect on June 1, 2020.  Per the announcements, these apps are prohibited from registering new user accounts during the review period.

Separately, on July 4, CAC ordered the Didi app to be removed from Chinese app stores on the ground that the app seriously violated Chinese laws and regulations by “illegally collecting and using personal information” (the announcement is available here).  It is unclear whether this “take down” order is related to CRO’s ongoing cybersecurity review of Didi.

This post explains the requirements and procedures of cybersecurity review under the Measures, analyzes the focus of the current review against these three companies, and provides more background on recent enforcement actions against apps illegally collecting and processing personal information. …
Continue Reading China Initiates Cybersecurity Review of Didi ChuXing and Three Other Chinese Mobile Applications

On June 10, 2021, the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress (“NPC”) enacted the Data Security Law (“DSL”), which will take effect on September 1, 2021 (the official Chinese version is available here and Covington’s unofficial English translation is available here). This law creates a framework for the protection of broadly defined “data security” from a national security perspective.
Continue Reading China Enacts Data Security Law

In Part 1 of this blog series (see here), we discussed recent data protection developments in China’s e-commerce sector.  In this post, we discuss recently issued rules aimed at improving data governance in China’s financial sector that could also have data protection implications.  These rules can be categorized as falling into two groups: the first group focuses on general data governance requirements applicable to all financial institutions, and the second group regulates specific types of financial services.

These new rules were published by the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (“CBIRC”) and People’s Bank of China (“PBOC”) during the first quarter of 2021, and include:

  • Guidelines for Data Capacity-Building in the Financial Industry (“Guidelines”) (official Chinese version available here);
  • Financial Data Security – Data Life Cycle Security Standard (“Standard”) (official Chinese version available here); and
  • Draft Credit Reporting Management Measures (“Draft Measures”) (official Chinese version available here).

Both the Guidelines and Standard provide detailed criteria for financial institutions on the proper collection, use and protection of “financial data,” while the Draft Measures introduce data-related requirements for licensed credit reporting agencies.  All of these new rules include data security requirements for both personal and non-personal data.…

Continue Reading Privacy Updates from China: Proliferation of Sector-Specific Rules As Key Legislation Remains Pending – Part 2: Data Protection in the Financial Sector

When China’s legislature, the National People’s Congress (“NPC”), enacted the Cybersecurity Law (“CSL”) in 2017, it set into motion a new era of data governance in China.  Three years later, in 2020, the NPC followed up this landmark act with two other legislative milestones in this space: the draft Data Security Law (“DSL”) (see our blogpost here) and draft Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”) (see our client alert here).  Both the PIPL and DSL will be finalized this year.  Taken as a whole, these three laws form an over-arching framework that will govern data protection and cybersecurity in China for years to come.

While the DSL and PIPL have remained in draft form over the past year, the Chinese government has not stood idly by – instead, various Chinese regulators have continued to introduce data- and cyber-related rules in  key sectors.  Many of these sectoral rules do not appear to be primarily focused on data protection or cybersecurity, yet they may indirectly impact the collection, use and processing of personal information in specific sectors.  The rollout of these new rules has not been fully coordinated, and the approaches taken in some cases deviate from the over-arching framework mentioned above.  We expect this divergence to remain, even after the finalization of the PIPL and DSL.  Consequently, China’s data and cyber regime will likely present a complex web of regulatory rules for organizations to navigate – both now and in the years ahead.

In this blog series, we examine several recently-introduced data and cyber rules in the areas of e-commerce, finance, healthcare, and artificial intelligence – all of which are rapidly expanding sectors in China where the collection and use of massive amounts of personal information have given rise to a variety of regulatory concerns.  We will also explain, in the last blogpost of this series, China’s recent push to regulate how mobile applications can collect and process user data.

In our first blogpost of this series, we focus on recent developments in China’s e-commerce sector.…

Continue Reading Privacy Updates from China: Proliferation of Sector-Specific Rules As Key Legislation Remains Pending – Part 1: Data Protection in the E-Commerce Sector