Privacy laws no longer lost in translation
Chinese legal experts will be able to get a better insight into privacy laws in the Commonwealth and how they affect the media thanks to a collaboration between a visiting researcher and Victoria Faculty of Law Associate Professor Nicole Moreham.Dr Lina Zhou, an associate professor at the Communication University of China in Beijing is translating the third edition of The Law of Privacy and the Media, co-edited by Nicole and English High Court judge, Sir Mark Warby.
The book covers all aspects of the English law of privacy that affect the media, including the misuse of private information, breach of confidence, harassment, eavesdropping, data protection legislation and copyright. Its main focus is the law of England and Wales but it also contains sections of New Zealand, Australian, Canadian, US, South African, French, and German law and on the protection of privacy in international instruments.
“The new edition responds to the continuing expansion of the law of privacy—it has nearly 250 new cases in it—and to public interest events such as the phone hacking scandal in the UK. It also has a new chapter of the law relating to ‘new media’, such as blogs and social networking sites,” says Nicole.
Nicole says Lina approached her about translating the second edition but with the third edition due to be published by Oxford University Press in January 2016, she was able to offer Lina the text for the third edition instead. The translated version is expected to be published by the China University of Political Science and Law (CUPL) Press in early 2017.
Lina says her interest in privacy protection in the UK was sparked by the phone hacking scandal, which erupted while she was doing her doctoral thesis on media intrusion to privacy.
“I realised that compared to lots of research available in China on US privacy, there was very little about the English approach. When I came across Dr Moreham’s research I became increasingly interested in translating her leading privacy work into Chinese.”
Currently in the midst of translating the book’s 800 pages, Lina admits she has a huge and demanding task ahead. She is expecting the project to take over 12 months.
“Irrespective of the hundreds of pages of text I need to translate, the differences in legal systems, philosophy and cultures will be a challenge. But with China and the rest of the world facing the same problems with privacy, big data, the internet and new media, I am encouraged to do the job well,” says Lina.
“The book will fill in the blanks around privacy protection in England and the Commonealth and will provide new and useful information for Chinese scholars and students.”