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HONG KONG, Dec 12 (SCMP): The online shame and abuse of a young woman with Covid-19 in Chengdu, southwest China, has been a punishment for the 24-year-old man who posted his details on his networking account social.
Chengdu police said Wednesday afternoon that the man, surnamed Wang, had been punished, without elaborating. Hours earlier, his victim spoke on the Toutiao online forum, for the first time since the attacks began.
The 20-year-old woman, surnamed Zhao, said that she and her family had been attacked online and that she had received threats on her phone.
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Zhao, who is in quarantine and receiving treatment at a local hospital, said he would not have come out had he known he had the virus. “I just caught Covid-19, I am also a victim,” he wrote.
Zhao’s grandparents, a couple in their 60s and 70s, became Chengdu’s first local cases in months on Monday, when they went to the hospital to have their cough checked. The next day, Zhao’s infection was also confirmed.
The local health authority immediately released details of Zhao’s whereabouts for the past 14 days on its website, the routine with new Covid-19 cases, and asked anyone who has come across her to be present before the authorities and take the test.
Parts of the city were also closed in response to infections, prompting many to complain about the inconvenience. But soon the public’s attention turned to Zhao’s lifestyle and the shame and doxxing began.
It was noted that Zhao, who is unemployed, had repeatedly been to various bars, clubs, and a nail salon. Within hours, her alleged personal identification number, home address, photos, and screenshots of her social media posts were circulating online, and she had become the target of a severe vitriologist.
“She is 20 years old, she does not go to school or work, she rents a flat alone and goes to bars. We all know what it does, ”read one post.
Others came to Zhao’s defense. Catch Up, a Weibo blog that focuses on gender equality issues, said that Zhao’s lifestyle was common among many young people and should not be criticized.
Contact tracking: privacy vs urgency in the fight against Covid-19
In January, an Excel form, containing the personal information of more than 7,000 people who had returned home from Wuhan, the original epicenter of the outbreak, was leaked online. Many were subjected to threatening and embarrassed text messages online.
In response to the pandemic, China has been accelerating the digitization of private services, emphasizing the need to collect personal information for disease control.
As part of this campaign, an extensive health code system based on a QR code has been developed that must be displayed before entering hospitals, shopping centers, banks and public transport.
The momentum of information gathering has prompted many in China to express concern about the risks of invasions of privacy and the leakage of personal data.
Deng Zhe, a lawyer with the Shanghai-based Guantao Law Firm, said that, from a legal perspective, invading the privacy of others could result in a fine, arrest or even criminal charges in China.
“What we have to think about is how to balance disease prevention and control and the public’s right to information,” he said, adding that the most important principle was to have authorization for personal data.
Incidents of public embarrassment related to the pandemic have occurred internationally. In March, an influencer in Vietnam who became the country’s 17th confirmed case was attacked on Instagram. And, during the Singapore lockdown, a woman was abused when she was mistaken for someone who refused to wear a mask at a food stall in a widely shared video. – South China morning post
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