With Pyongyang’s illicit fuel trade seemingly on pace to recover in 2022, experts say a recently-enacted Chinese privacy law will handicap international efforts to keep tabs on Kim Jong Un’s web of illicit procurement networks.

In Nov. 2021, China enacted the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL), introducing a swath of regulations for “sensitive personal information” leaving the country. 

“No organization or individual may illegally collect, use, process, or transmit other people’s personal information, or illegally trade, provide, or disclose other people’s personal information, or engage in the processing of personal information that endangers