Research On The Judicial Determination Concerning The Crime Of Infringing Citizens’ Personal Information

In recent years,citizens’ personal information has been dubbed "new wealth","new oil","new energy" and other titles because of the great convenience it brings people.However,it also faces the risk of being infringed and the problem of how to protect it.Although the protection of personal information in our country’s laws is slightly behind that in other countries,the criminal law responded to this in a timely manner.In 2009,the criminal content of infringement of citizens’ personal information was included in the Criminal Law Amendment(VII)for the first time.It was revised and improved in the 2015 "Criminal Law Amendment(IX)".In 2017,the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate issued relevant judicial interpretations for this crime in order to better combat crimes.However,due to the ambiguity of legislative language,the explosion of information and the constantly changing ways of committing crimes in the Internet Age,many problems have been exposed in the process of determining and handling the crime of infringing on citizens’ personal information in judicial practice.How to better determine and handle crimes has no doubt become particularly important for the utilization and protection of citizens’ personal information.Specifically speaking,this crime faces many controversies regarding the judicial determinations of the scope and type of citizens’ personal information,behavioral modes,legal interests to be protected,violation of relevant national regulations,cases of severe offence,and cases of particularly severe offence.Among them,the indistinct definition of the scope of citizens’ personal information and the scope of breaches against the relevant national regulations will seriously affect the accurate determination of this crime.The insufficient concreteness regarding the measurement of cases of severe offence and cases of particularly severe offence will lead to the frequent occurrence of different verdicts for the cases of the same nature,and,as time goes on,the dimming of the public confidence on justice.This thesis analyzes theories in academic volumes,doctrines,opinions etc.,categorizes some more typical judicial practice cases,utilizes research methods such as literature analysis and case study methods and put forward some suggestions for the predicament of this crime in judicial determination.The preliminary conclusion is that in terms of improving legislation,it is recommended that the Personal Information Protection Law be formally passed as soon as possible in our nation,so as to play a role in leading the preconditioned provisions.At present,our country’s Personal Information Protection Law has been released to the public for comments.It is believed that our country’s first special law to protect citizens’ personal information will be passed soon.In terms of judicial improvement,it is recommended to issue specific and targeted judicial interpretations to clarify the scope of "citizens’ personal information" and narrow the interpretation of "violation of relevant national regulations",that is,to clarify the prerequisites for the determination of the crime of infringing on citizens’ personal information.Regarding the determination of behavioral modes and contents,"selling,buying,and providing personal information" is relatively common and easy to determine in judicial practice.However,the diversification of criminal methods due to rapid development of Internet,makes it difficult to clearly define " unlawfully obtaining personal information by other methods".Clarifying the meaning of "illegal" and "other methods" is helpful to correctly determine whether it constitutes the objective element for the crime of infringing on citizens’ personal information.On the basis of the aspects such as the amount of information infringed,the number of crimes committed by the perpetrator,the amount of illegal gains and the amount of profit,etc.,comprehensively deliberate what is "serious offences",and on the basis of "severe offences",measure whether the criterion for "particularly severe circumstances" is reasonable,in order to achieve the rationalization of criteria for conviction and measurement of punishments.Only after the clarification of the various related concepts,scopes and criteria,can we solve the difficulty of judicial determination for judicial staff in a reasonable way.