Personality Rights in Chinese Tort Law

Civil Code Book IV: Personality Rights

The Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China (mínfǎ diǎn), effective 1 January 2021, introduced Book IV (Personality Rights) as the first dedicated codification of personality rights in Chinese civil law. Book IV (Articles 989–1039) represents a significant expansion of personality rights protection, establishing rights as standalone civil rights rather than mere interests protected derivatively through tort law. The Code defines personality rights as the rights enjoyed by civil subjects over their life, body, health, name, portrait, reputation, honour, privacy, and other personal interests.

Personality rights under the Civil Code are characterised as non-transferable, non-waivable, and non-encumberable, except as provided by law. The Code establishes a distinction between general personality rights (the right to personal freedom and personal dignity) and specific personality rights (name, portrait, reputation, honour, privacy). The general personality right in Article 990 serves as a residual category, allowing courts to protect personality interests not specifically enumerated.

Right to Name

The right to name (xìngmíng quán) is protected under Articles 1012–1017 of the Civil Code. Every natural person has the right to decide, use, change, or permit others to use their name in accordance with law. The right extends to legal persons (right to trade name) and unincorporated organisations. The Code prohibits: interference with another’s right to use their name; misappropriation of another’s name; and fraudulent use of another’s name for improper purposes.

The Civil Code introduced specific protection for cyber-accounts and pseudonyms employed by individuals, particularly authors and online content creators, extending the right to name to the digital environment. Courts have awarded damages for unauthorised use of names in advertising, unauthorised registration of domain names incorporating another’s name, and the use of deceptively similar names by competing businesses.

Right to Portrait

The right to portrait (xiāoxiàng quán) under Articles 1018–1023 of the Civil Code grants every natural person the exclusive right to make, use, and authorise others to use their likeness. The right applies to all forms of visual representation, including photographs, videos, paintings, and digital images. The Code prohibits the unauthorised production, use, or publication of another person’s portrait, as well as the distortion, defacement, or improper manipulation of portrait images.

Limited exceptions apply for: (1) personal use within necessary scope; (2) reasonable use in news reporting; (3) use by government authorities for official purposes; and (4) use in public interest contexts such as public security and law enforcement. The Shan Zhong v Beijing Zhongchuang case (2022) established important principles regarding the unauthorised use of individual portraits in AI-generated content and deepfake technology, with courts extending portrait right protection to digital and AI-rendered likenesses.

Right to Reputation and Honour

The right to reputation (míngyù quán) and right to honour (róngyù quán) are protected under Articles 1024–1031 of the Civil Code. Reputation is defined as the social evaluation of a person’s moral character, competence, and conduct. Defamation may be established by demonstrating that the defendant published false factual statements that caused damage to the plaintiff’s reputation. The burden of proof on truth is on the defendant in defamation cases.

The right to honour protects the recognition conferred by the state or society for meritorious service or achievement. Unauthorised deprivation or belittlement of another’s honour is prohibited. The Civil Code provides specific protection for deceased persons’ personality rights, allowing spouses, children, and parents to assert claims for defamation or other personality rights violations against deceased individuals for a period of three years after death.

Right to Privacy

The right to privacy (yǐnsī quán) is broadly defined in Articles 1032–1039 of the Civil Code as the right to be undisturbed in one’s private life and to maintain the confidentiality of personal private information. The Code enumerates specific privacy interests including: the private space of a natural person (home, hotel rooms, hospital rooms); private activities (daily life, social contacts); private body parts and physical integrity; private information (health data, genetic data, financial information); and freedom from harassment, unwanted surveillance, or intrusive communications.

The Civil Code prohibits: intrusion into private spaces without consent; surveillance, photographing, or recording of private activities; harassment through telephone, text, or email; photography of private body parts; and disclosure or processing of private information without consent. The privacy provisions operate in coordination with the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL, 2021), which provides additional protections for personal information as a distinct but overlapping legal interest.

Personal Information Protection

The Personal Information Protection Law (gèrén xìnxī bǎohù fǎ), effective 1 November 2021, establishes a comprehensive framework for the protection of personal information, operating alongside the personality rights provisions of the Civil Code. The PIPL defines personal information broadly to include any information related to an identified or identifiable natural person, whether recorded electronically or otherwise. The Law requires consent for processing, establishes data subject rights including the right to access, correct, delete, and port personal information, and imposes obligations on data processors including data localisation, security assessments for cross-border transfers, and data protection impact assessments.

Right to Be Forgotten

China does not have a statutory right to be forgotten comparable to Article 17 of the EU GDPR. However, the PIPL grants individuals the right to request deletion of personal information in specified circumstances, including where the purpose of processing has been achieved, where processing is no longer necessary, or where the data subject withdraws consent. The SPC has addressed requests for deletion of search engine results and historical information in several guiding cases, balancing personality rights against the public interest in access to information. The leading case of Ren Jiayu v Baidu (2015) established the principle that individuals may request the de-listing of outdated or inaccurate search results that cause substantial harm to reputation or privacy.

Injunctions

Personality rights are protected through both pre-judgment injunctions (língxiān jìntiào lìng) and post-judgment remedies. The SPC Provisions on Injunctions in Personality Rights Cases (2021) establish procedures for obtaining urgent injunctive relief where personality rights are being violated or imminently threatened. Applicants must demonstrate: (1) a high probability of success on the merits; (2) irreparable harm if the injunction is not granted; and (3) a balance of harm favouring the applicant. Injunctions may order the removal of content, cessation of publication, or blocking of access. Violation of an injunction is punishable as contempt of court. Post-judgment remedies include damages, apologies, and corrective statements published at the defendant’s expense.