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Law / China

Civil Code, portrait right and protection of the voice

Civil Code of the People's Republic of China (中华人民共和国民法典), arts. 1019, 1023

archived copyRead from a public archive copy, not the publisher directly. The publisher does not serve this page to automated readers, so a direct fetch was not an option here; how we access sources. Archived 2020. Publisher's page: http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2020-06/01/content_5516649.htm

In force since .

An AI prohibited practices rule binding public and private bodies.

Criminal exposure
No
Private right of action
Yes
Obligation class
Consent, Prohibition
Audit expectation
none
Setting the rule reaches
General

What it requires

  • Do not infringe another person's portrait right by defacing or disfiguring their portrait, or by forging it with information technology means (art. 1019, para. 1).
  • Obtain the portrait right holder's consent before making, using, or publicly disclosing their portrait, unless the law provides otherwise (art. 1019, para. 1).
  • Treat the protection of a natural person's voice as following the provisions on the protection of the portrait right, which article 1023 applies to the voice by reference (art. 1023, para. 2).
  • Rely on the consent exceptions only where they fit: article 1020 permits, without consent, reasonable acts such as using an already public portrait within the necessary scope for personal study, art appreciation, classroom teaching, or scientific research, and unavoidably making, using, or publicly disclosing a portrait in news reporting.

These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text.

In the frameworks

NIST AI RMF
  • MAP 3.3Targeted application scope is specified and documented based on the system’s capability, established context, and AI system categorization.
NIST AI 600-1
MIT mitigations Draft
  • 1.5Safety Decision Frameworks
  • 3.3Access Management
NIST Privacy Framework
  • CT.PO-P1Policies, processes, and procedures for authorizing data processing (e.g., organizational decisions, individual consent), revoking authorizations, and maintaining authorizations are established and in place.
FINOS AIGF
ETSI EN 304 223
  • 5.1.2-1Business need and security risks written down and assessed before deciding to build an AI system.
  • 5.1.4-5End-users told which uses of the system are prohibited.

Our reading of where this law's duties sit in each framework. It never says that running a control meets the law. How we read a framework against the law

Identifiers refer to ETSI EN 304 223 V2.1.1 (2025-12), © ETSI 2025, all rights reserved. ETSI owns the standard; no ETSI text (titles or sentences) is reproduced here. The standard is free to download from ETSI.

Who enforces it

Enforcement body

The people's courts, on a civil claim by the person whose personality right is infringed, including an application for an order that the actor stop the conduct.

Settledness

As of
Open questions
Does Article 1023's rule that the protection of a natural person's voice applies by reference to the provisions on the protection of the portrait right carry over Article 1019's ban on forging a portrait by information technology means to a synthesized voice?

What record it asks for

Logging duty

Article 1019 prohibits infringing a portrait right by defacing, disfiguring or forging it with information technology, and bars making, using or publicly disclosing a portrait without the right holder's consent; Article 1023 applies the same protection to a natural person's voice. Neither article requires a log or record to be kept.

Kind
None
As of

What this law does

Drafted with AI

Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page. How this site is made

Research summary

Legal information, not legal advice. This is LexLint's own research summary of a public legal source, and it creates no attorney-client relationship. For decisions that matter, consult qualified counsel in the relevant jurisdiction. About LexLint

Article 1019 provides that no organization or individual may infringe another person's portrait right by defacing or disfiguring the portrait, or by forging it with information technology means. Article 1019 also provides that, unless the law provides otherwise, no one may make, use, or publicly disclose a person's portrait without the portrait right holder's consent.

Article 1018 defines a portrait as the external image of a specific natural person, reflected on a carrier through images, sculpture, painting or similar means, by which that person can be identified. Article 1023 provides that the protection of a natural person's voice applies by reference the provisions on the protection of the portrait right.

Article 1020 permits, without the portrait right holder's consent, reasonable acts such as using an already public portrait within the necessary scope for personal study, art appreciation, classroom teaching, or scientific research, and unavoidably making, using, or publicly disclosing a portrait in news reporting. The Civil Code took effect on .

When LexLint raises it

When your app profile says your app generates audio with AI, generates images with AI or generates video with AI.

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