Penalties for businesses and individuals leaking personal information will be toughened as the Cabinet is set to approve draft amendments to a data-protection rule.
"While we're aware of legislators' concerns, we thought it would be a better idea to stick with our own draft amendments to the Computer-Processed Personal Data Protection Law (
Liu was referring to another draft proposed by DPP lawmakers Tsai Huang-liang (
The trio have called for a broader application of the law and for heavier punishment for people caught selling sensitive information following a furor over fraud cases reported in March this year.
Capping a one-year investigation, the Kaohsiung District Prosecutor's Office in May brought a criminal case against 32 civil servants and civilians for their role in leaking 2 million entries of illegally obtained personal information.
Prosecutors found that an organized crime syndicate headed by Hsiao Ron-hsiung (
Hsiao then sold the illegally obtained information to other crime rings and individuals, including lawmakers, police officers and employees of credit information offices.
After learning that civil servants were believed to be involved in the case, Premier Yu Shyi-kun requested government agencies concerned to map out pre-emptive measures and beef up efforts to strengthen the internal audits of telecom service providers.
Yu also requested legal revisions to existing rules to curb similar occurrences in the future.
One of the laws that needs to be revamped is the Computer-Processed Personal Data Protection Law.
Under the Cabinet's draft, the law would cover all kinds of personal information which could be deemed private and deserved protection.
The law presently protects only personal information which is managed, processed, stored or distributed by computers.
The punishment for those who release personal information for commercial purposes would also be increased.
While the current maximum sentence is a two-year jail term or a NT$40,000 fine, the draft would increase this to up to five years imprisonment or a maximum fine of NT$1 million.
The three DPP lawmakers, however, proposed to increase this to seven years imprisonment and/or a maximum fine of NT$1 million, claiming that heavier punishments always serve as a more effective deterrent.
In addition, groups enjoying the prerogative to obtain personal information would have that privilege revoked.
Under current rules, workers in eight professional fields are allowed to collect personal information for business purposes. These eight professions are: Private detective agencies, banks, hospitals, schools, telecom and Internet service providers, insurance companies, the media and stock-exchange companies.
According to an official personal information protection review, conducted by the Directorate General of Telecommunications (DGT), Taiwan Cellular Corp (台灣大) and Mobitai Communications Co Ltd (東信電訊) were ranked as the leaders in protecting customer personal information from their peers.
The two mobile operators were followed in sequence by First International Telecom (
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it is fully aware of the situation following reports that the son of ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai (薄熙來) has arrived in Taiwan and is to marry a Taiwanese. Local media reported that Bo Guagua (薄瓜瓜), son of the former member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is to marry the granddaughter of Luodong Poh-Ai Hospital founder Hsu Wen-cheng (許文政). The pair met when studying abroad and arranged to get married this year, with the wedding breakfast to be held at The One holiday resort in Hsinchu
An orange gas cloud that leaked from a waste management plant yesterday morning in Taoyuan’s Guanyin District (觀音) was likely caused by acidic waste, authorities said, adding that it posed no immediate harm. The leak occurred at a plant in the district’s Environmental Science and Technology Park at about 7am, the Taoyuan Fire Department said. Firefighters discovered a cloud of unidentified orange gas leaking from a waste tank when they arrived on the site, it said, adding that they put on Level A chemical protection before entering the building. After finding there was no continuous leak, the department worked with the city’s Department
‘SIGN OF DANGER’: Beijing has never directly named Taiwanese leaders before, so China is saying that its actions are aimed at the DPP, a foundation official said National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) yesterday accused Beijing of spreading propaganda, saying that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had singled out President William Lai (賴清德) in his meeting with US President Joe Biden when talking about those whose “true nature” seek Taiwanese independence. The Biden-Xi meeting took place on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Peru on Saturday. “If the US cares about maintaining peace across the Taiwan Strait, it is crucial that it sees clearly the true nature of Lai and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in seeking Taiwanese independence, handles the Taiwan question with extra
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
RSS