Shanghai’s white list has made it the first city on the mainland to implement concrete local rules to expedite the flow of general data overseas. Image: Shutterstock
Shanghai on Friday released a white list to expedite cross-border data transfers for companies that operate in its pilot free-trade zone, including electric vehicle maker Tesla, providing a much-needed boost for the country’s efforts to retain and reel in more international business.
The first batch of this “general data” list, which covers 64 categories, will enable enterprises involved in intelligent connected vehicles, publicly offered funds and biopharmaceuticals to make data transfers overseas without obtaining regulatory approval, according to a WeChat post by authorities at Lingang New Area, part of Shanghai’s free-trade zone in Pudong district.
The release of that list has made Shanghai the first city on the mainland to implement concrete local rules to expedite the flow of general data overseas, several months after it opened an industrial estate focused on the data industry.
Shanghai’s three-tiered, cross-border information regime identifies “important data” as those that require security assessment by local authorities, while those classified as “core data” are prohibited from being transferred overseas.
An aerial view of a construction site at Lingang New Area, part of Shanghai’s pilot free-trade zone in Pudong district. Photo: Xinhua
This initiative by China’s commercial and financial hub is expected to fix a sore point for Tesla and other multinational companies under that three-tiered cross-border data flow regime.
Tesla, along with 13 other automotive companies such as Porsche’s China sales arm and SAIC Motor, formed part of the working group that drafted the general data list, according to an earlier local media report.
The list would enable Tesla, which operates a vast Gigafactory in Lingang New Area, to ascertain which data can be transferred abroad without restrictions and which information must receive further scrutiny. New Lingang Area’s post on Friday did not mention any company by name, although Tesla is expected to fall under firms involved in intelligent connected vehicles.
For Tesla, user-generated data in mainland China is an important resource for the company to train its autonomous driving algorithms.
A truck transports new Tesla cars at the US carmaker’s Gigafactory in Shanghai on May 13, 2021. Photo: Reuters
In March, internet watchdog the Cyberspace Administration of China implemented new rules designed to ease regulation on cross-border data flows, including exemptions under certain scenarios to export data without official security assessment.
That followed measures released last August by the State Council, which called for establishing “green channels” for qualified foreign companies to export data, and to roll out a list of general data that can be transferred freely across the border in Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin.
Shanghai has envisioned Lingang New Area as an artificial intelligence (AI) “highland”, assembling national talent and resources to help promote the free flow of data.
The area’s International Data Economy Industrial Park is tasked with “implementing safe and orderly cross-border flows of international online data”, according to a policy document unveiled last October by Lingang New Area authorities. That estate would serve as home to more than 100 leading data companies, which could generate a combined output of over 100 billion yuan (US$13.8 billion) by 2025.
