If There Needs No Privacy Right in the Chinese Civil Code?——New Thoughts on Privacy and the Right to Privacy

Abstract

The Chinese Civil Code provided explicit new regulations on privacy and the right to privacy in article 1032 and 1033 in 2020 at the first time. It defines privacy as personal tranquility, and private spaces, private activities and private information that one is unwilling to be known by others. This concept of privacy is highly subjective, making privacy right a pocket right in civil law. Any portraits, names and other personal information that are protected by portrait right and other civil rights can be in the protection of privacy right only if it is unwilling to be known. It results the privacy right being unspecified and its boundary being unclear, fails to meet the basic requirements of a concrete personality right in Chinese Civil Law, which has the different legal system with American of “general privacy right framework”. This article argues that, based on the development history of traditional Chinese “yin si” and the concept of privacy, legal privacy in China should be defined as personal information that is unrelated to public or societal interests but directly concerns an individual's reputation or personal dignity. Thus, privacy clearly encompasses both personal dignity and reputation interests. Given that Chinese Civil Code acknowledges the general personality right, personal dignity in privacy can be protected through this right, while reputation interests can be attributed to the right of reputation. Therefore, after a proper understanding of the concept of legal privacy in Chinese Civil Code, it is worth exploring whether there is a need for the introduction and separate regulation of the concept of the right to privacy.