A concept photo of digital economy Photo: VCG

Deputies and members at the ongoing two sessions hailed China's move to form a national data bureau, and said that the move is "a response to the requirements of the digital China strategy" and will improve China's data security.

Chinese experts also said such a move "is in full compliance with international practice," and it will play a positive role in expanding the development of cross-border trade. 

The remarks came after China said on Tuesday that it will establish a national data bureau.

The proposed bureau will be administered by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country's top economic planner, and it will be responsible for advancing the development of data-related fundamental institutions, coordinating the integration, sharing, development and application of data resources, and pushing forward the planning and building of a digital China, the digital economy and a digital society, among other functions.

"The establishment of the bureau is fully in line with international practice, and also in line with the trend that the global economy is trying to create new growth points in the post-pandemic era," Zuo Xiaodong, vice president of the China Information Security Research Institute, told the Global Times on Wednesday. 

The US and the EU have designated specialized agencies in terms of digital security, but they have not established similar independent agencies in terms of using data as an engine to promote the development of the digital economy, Zuo added. 

The establishment of the bureau is a response to the requirements of the digital China strategy with a core of big data, and it is conducive to promote the safe and orderly flow of data from the top-level design level, Zhou Hongyi, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, said on Wednesday. He is also founder and chairman of 360 Security Technology. 

China has witnessed the fast growth of digital and industrial digitization in recent years. The scale of China's digital economy reached 45.5 trillion yuan ($6.54 trillion) in 2021, ranking second in the world, and accounted for 39.8 percent of the country's GDP, according to a white paper released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology in July last year. 

With the rapid development of digital technologies such as 5G, artificial intelligence (AI) and big data, many high-tech companies have improved their operational efficiency and demonstrated strong economic resilience and potential by leveraging these digital technologies.

Shenzhen Kinwong Electronic Co is a high-tech manufacturing company that focuses on the research and development, production and sales of printed circuit boards. In the past, due to the highly automated production of printed circuit boards, workers had to closely monitor machines to prevent errors.

After continuous exploration, the company developed a digital and mobile platform based on Tencent's WeCom, which connects machines, workers and equipment engineers, forming an efficient digital closed-loop processing chain. "Now, even before I can make a phone call, the equipment engineer has already arrived on site," Huang told the Global Times on Wednesday. 

Zuo said that the trend of the digital economy is to jointly build a community of shared future in cyberspace, with all countries to share the data dividend, which will play a positive role in expanding data imports and exports and promoting the development of cross-border trade.