Four to face trial for trading personal details; telecoms staff leaks blamed

Four suspects accused of buying and selling the personal details of more than 2 million people will face trial this month at Haidian district court.

According to indictments filed with the court, Guo is alleged to have traded the data of more than 700,000 people on the Internet between May and August last year, while fellow defendant Liu, 27, is said to have acquired 852,942 pieces of personal information from November 2009 to August 2010.

They will face the judges alongside telesales agents Gao and Hong, who are accused of buying 77,959 people's data from Liu and using it to promote products by their company. (Defendants cannot legally be named in the press before a trial.)

Related readings:  Protection of personal details  Personal details need protection

The case is one of several that have or will be heard at Haidian court, with offenders facing a maximum of three years in prison. A spokesman for the district people's procuratorate said that reports of crooks trading personal details have steadily increased since the crime was introduced two years ago.

A 34-year-old auto insurance saleswoman called Wang is in detention and awaiting trial over claims she spent 300 yuan to buy 600,000 people's data.

Last December, Yuan Zheng, 33, and 37-year-old Yong Zhengde also became the first private investigators to be jailed for the offense. They both received sentences of one year.

A survey by Chaoyang district court at the end of last year found that most of the data being traded is leaked by employees at telecommunications companies, who sell off home addresses, phone numbers and other details stored on internal systems.

Wu Xiaochen at China Netcom, Tang Nayu at China Unicom and 28-year-old Zhang Ning at China Mobile were sentenced to more than two years in prison in Chaoyang last year after being found guilty of passing on personal data obtained at work to private detective agencies.

After the trial, the court sent a judicial note to telecom companies urging executives to better protect users' data. The move prompted China Unicom to release a statement pledging to improve its security and restrict employees' access to information.

"There are several common tricks these employees use to get hold of personal details," explained judge Zhu Shulong at Chaoyang district court.

"They note down basic details like names, addresses, ID numbers when customers register phone numbers; they review short text messages and call histories on internal databases, and some even locate customers through GPRS networks."

Many experts and prosecutors are now calling for a specific law to help curb the rampant trade of personal information throughout China.

"It needs to be a joint effort," said Dai Zhuo, a director at Haidian district people's procuratorate.

"Citizen need to be more aware when giving out their personal information to register for credit cards, cell phone numbers or social networking websites. Companies and authorities also need to strengthen their protection of personal data, while the judicial authority must put forward specific explanations for the new crime."