How Chinese Businesses Should Prepare For China's New Cybersecurity Law

On 10 October 2016, we sent an alert about the second draft of China's new Cybersecurity law. On 7 November 2016, the draft became law. It will come into effect on 1 June 2017.

The Cybersecurity law is China's first comprehensive regime on cybersecurity and it will impact all companies operating in China. The new law is substantially consistent with the drafts; an in-depth review of the second draft can be found here.

However, there are two changes since the second draft that merit attention.

Changes to the definition of "Key Infrastructures":

In the first draft of the law, "Key Infrastructures" included references to some specific sectors such as energy, public communication, social security and finance. However, these references were deleted in the second draft so that "Key Infrastructures" was defined as those "industries that relate to national security, national economy, citizen's wellbeing, and public interests".