China’s Quest to Dismantle Data Silos and Operationalize Its Massive Government Data Resources

Date & Time: May 18, 2026 (Monday) 11:00-12:00

Venue: Room 901, 9/F Cheng Yu Tung Tower, The University of Hong Kong

Language: English

(In-person Event)   

Abstract:

China’s June 2025 Regulations on Government Data Sharing establish the country’s first comprehensive legal framework governing how central and local government departments should share the data they hold. Building on two decades of policy efforts to dismantle information silos, the Regulations create a federated, request-driven architecture anchored by a national government data catalog, a tiered data classification system, and a national integrated government big data platform. They mandate data quality management and error correction, impose time-sensitive request and response procedures, shift data security responsibility to data-using departments, and prohibit providing departments from imposing unauthorized conditions and repeatedly collecting from the public data already accessible through sharing. The Regulations operate within a broader national data infrastructure strategy to maximize data circulation, in part to support China’s AI ambitions, as well as the digital economy more generally. While they represent a significant institutional advance — backed by CCP political authority and legally anchored in China’s cybersecurity, data security, and personal information protection framework — many challenges remain and multiple related initiatives, including open data legislation, a for-fee authorized operation regime for commercially valuable public data resources, and developing a data property rights system, remain works in progress.

Speaker：

Jamie P. Horsley is a Senior Fellow at the Paul Tsai China Center, Yale Law School and Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings John L. Thornton China Center. At Yale since 2002, she formerly was Executive Director of the Yale China Law Center. Her research broadly involves issues of governance and regulatory reform in China, including information disclosure, public participation, government accountability, and data governance. Prior to Yale, she studied and worked in Greater China area for 13 years, including as a lawyer in Beijing and Hong Kong; Commercial Attaché at the U.S. Embassies in Beijing and Manila; and corporate executive with Motorola based in Beijing. She holds a Stanford University B.A., University of Michigan Chinese Studies M.A., and Harvard Law School J.D.  She is a member and former Director of the National Committee for US-China Relations and a recent Trustee of the Yale-China Association. She was a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars from 2015-16.

Chair:

Ying Xia is Assistant Professor of Law and Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, The University of Hong Kong

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