A group of United States senators introduced a bill that would allow the president to block exports of data to countries that post a national security risk.
Reuters reported that the bill had bipartisan support and was co-sponsored by Republican Senator Marco Rubio and Democratic Senator Ron Wyden.
“Right now it’s perfectly legal for a company in China to buy huge databases of sensitive information from data brokers about the movements or health records of millions of Americans, and then share that information with the Chinese government,” Wyden said of the bill according to Reuters.
Rubio added that “we cannot trust private companies to protect Americans’ private data, especially given how many of them do business in China.”
Reuters reported that an aide for Senator Wyden said that China was included on the list of “high-risk” countries.
For its part, China denied any wrongdoing. Reuters reported that the Chinese Embassy in the United States claimed that “on the issue of data security, China has been aboveboard, open and cooperative…The Chinese government strictly abides by the principles of the protection of data security, and prohibits and cracks down on illegal activities in accordance with law.”
The Reuters report added that the bill required the Commerce Department to issue licenses for “bulk exports of the identified categories of personal data to other countries, and deny exports to high-risk countries.” Low-risk countries would be unrestricted.
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