Establishing a Strengthened Personal Information Protection System
PIPC to Pursue Five Key Initiatives
The government is set to implement a strengthened personal information protection system as part of its national policy agenda, which includes increasing fines in proportion to the scale of personal information breaches and establishing legal grounds for punishing deepfake-related crimes.
The Personal Information Protection Commission announced on September 22 that its initiative to "establish a personal information protection system that ensures public peace of mind" was officially included among the 123 national policy tasks confirmed at the Cabinet meeting on September 16.
This policy task aims to strengthen corporate accountability and expand citizens' rights to prevent and respond to large-scale personal information leaks.
The Commission will pursue five key initiatives: ▲Strict sanctions for major incidents, recurrence prevention, and effective victim compensation ▲Guaranteeing the right to self-determination over personal information, including the digital right to be forgotten ▲Reestablishing a prevention-centered personal information protection system ▲Strengthening its role as a control tower for personal information in the era of artificial intelligence (AI) and data ▲Establishing a safe personal information utilization system, including special provisions for original data.
First, the Commission will build and strengthen a forensic lab, and introduce enforcement measures such as mandatory data submission orders when investigation subjects do not cooperate adequately.
Fines will be increased in proportion to the scale of damages, and in cases of significant harm, all users will be immediately notified of the breach. For minor violations, voluntary improvement will be encouraged, and support will be provided to small and micro businesses for damage recovery.
In addition, the system for quickly detecting and deleting illegally circulated personal information online will be enhanced, and legal grounds will be established to punish illegal transactions, thereby preventing secondary damage.
Measures to strengthen the right to self-determination over personal information will also be implemented. Specifically, the age for legal protection of children and adolescents' personal information will be raised from under 14 to under 18.
Public institutions will be required to notify data subjects when their personal information is provided to investigative agencies, and policies will be introduced to guarantee the privacy of deceased individuals and the rights of their families, further expanding the scope of self-determination rights.
Additionally, the Commission will seek to introduce a legal right for data subjects to request the deletion of AI-generated synthetic content such as deepfakes, and establish grounds for punishment. Proactive measures will also be taken to prevent privacy violations, such as restricting employment at CCTV monitoring facilities based on criminal history.
Standards will be established to ensure that companies secure dedicated personnel and budgets appropriate to the scale of their personal information processing, encouraging increased investment in personal information protection staff and budgets.
Legal grounds (AI special provisions) will be created to allow the use of high-quality original data necessary for AI development, and specific personal information processing standards applicable to new industries will be formulated.
An international cooperation framework for safe data transfers will be established to promote digital trade, including seeking equivalency recognition from countries with high data transfer demand such as the United Kingdom and Japan.
A representative of the Commission stated, "Through the implementation of these national policy tasks, we plan to focus our policy capabilities on ensuring the safe protection and utilization of personal information, thereby guaranteeing the freedom and rights of the people and delivering tangible results that citizens can directly experience."
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
