Improvement of China's System on Security Assessment of Outbound Personal Data Flow under the Background of CPTPP

Abstract

With the development of cross-border e-commerce's integration with the global economy, the cross-border data flow is playing an increasing important role in international economy and trade, and the smoothness of it directly or indirectly affects the improvement of the digital economy. Many countries or regions have established their own legal regulation systems for outbound data. Now China is the largest retail export economy in cross-border electronic commerce in the world, it application to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) is not smooth, and its data cross-border rules are quite different from CPTPP clauses, so it is difficult to align with them. Among them, the security assessment of outbound personal data flow system currently implemented in China is a major factor that makes connecting the cross-border personal data flow rules of China with CPTPP cross-border personal data flow clauses more difficult. By comparing this system in China with the cross-border personal data flow regulation system in the United States and the European Union, as well as the relevant provisions of CPTPP, this paper points out that there are some problems in this system in China, such as vague definition of the basic concept "important data" and excessive burden on data processors, and puts forward some legislative improvement measures to solve these existing problems, such as clarifying "important data", constructing a classification and grading system for cross-border data flow, and reshaping the distribution system of compliance responsibility for safety assessment.