Online Data Protection in Japan

Until recently, the rapid growth of the Japanese
e-commerce industry was not paralleled with an
increase in privacy legislation to safeguard online
personal information. The Japanese bureaucracy
attempted to fill this vacuum by releasing
self-regulatory guidelines that were originally
promulgated in the United States. However, the
results of a content analysis showed that in spite of
this, Japanese Web sites still lagged far behind
their American counterparts in the development of
effective privacy policies. The author posits that
the ineffectual emulation of American made guidelines
was due to the varying cultural standards that are
found in both countries. In particular, an attempt
will be made to focus on the role of studied
nonobservance as a direct impediment towards the
development of effective privacy legislation in
Japan. With the conduct of e-commerce being
trans-boundary and the Japanese people pressing for
stronger judicial enforcement, it is perhaps time for
industry and government leaders in Japan to rethink
their strategy of enacting privacy protection
safeguards based on traditional Japanese culture.