Autonomous vehicles law and regulation in China

So far, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has not officially adopted international standards such as those issued by the Society of Automotive Engineers (“SAE Levels”) to define the classification of automated driving. On 20 August 2021, however, the national standards on Taxonomy of Driving Automation for Vehicles (GB/T 40429-2021) were issued, classifying the driving automation of Intelligent and Connected Vehicles (“ICV” or “ICVs”) into six levels (“ICV Levels”): (i) Level 0 driving automation - emergency assistance; (ii) Level 1 driving automation - partial driver assistance; (iii) Level 2 driving automation – combined driver assistance; (iv) Level 3 driving automation – conditionally automated driving; (v) Level 4 driving automation – highly automated driving; (vi) Level 5 driving automation - fully automated driving.

Under the Safety Guideline for the Use of Autonomous Vehicles in Transportation Services (Trial) (“Safety Guideline”) issued by the PRC Ministry of Transportation and effective on 21 November 2023, autonomous vehicles (“AV” or “AVs”) include conditional autonomous vehicles, highly autonomous vehicles, and fully autonomous vehicles, corresponding to Levels 3-5 of the ICV Levels.

According to the Norms for the Administration of Road Testing and Demonstration Applications of Intelligent and Connected Vehicles (Trial) ( “Road Test Norms”) which were jointly issued by various competent PRC Ministries on 27 July 2021 and became effective on the same day, ICVs refer to a new generation of vehicles equipped with advanced in-vehicle sensors, controllers, actuators, and other devices, which integrate modern communication and network technologies to realize the intelligent exchange and sharing of information between vehicles and X (people, vehicles, roads, clouds, etc.), and are capable of sensing complex environments, making decisions intelligently and controlling in a coordinated manner, making it possible to achieve safe, efficient, comfortable, and energy-saving driving, and eventually replace manual operations. The Road Test Norms also state that ICVs are often referred to as intelligent vehicles, AVs, etc.

Therefore, ICVs is a broad term and includes AVs under PRC legislation. We accordingly address the questions below based on the regulations regarding both ICVs and AVs.

There is no centralized regulatory framework under PRC law on ICVs or AVs. Instead, legal bases regulating ICVs or AVs are scattered in various ministerial regulations and industrial standards.

For example, the Road Test Norms stipulate the regulations for ICVs conducting road tests on public roads. The Safety Guidelines specify safety-related requirements for AVs’ passenger transportation operations, and there are also various other notices and policies issued by the PRC ministries regarding ICVs. The Notice on Strengthening the Administration of Surveying, Mapping and Geoinformation Security Relating to Intelligent and Connected Vehicles regulates that surveying and mapping activities related to ICVs shall be conducted in accordance with applicable laws. Specific issues addressed include the handling of confidential and sensitive geoinformation and data, requirements for the storage of geoinformation data and cross-border transfers, as well as the review of electronic navigation maps, among others. The Notice on Launching the Pilot Program of Market Access and Road Passage for Intelligent and Connected Vehicles stipulates the pilot application and implementation issues related to Level 3 and Level 4 ICVs of ICV Levels. The Notice on Further Strengthening the Administration of Admission, Recall, and Over-the-Air Software Updates for Intelligent and Connected Vehicles enhances the administration of product admission and recall for ICVs equipped with Combined Driver Assistance Systems and Over-The-Air upgrade functions.

Additionally, several national standards also stipulate requirements pertaining to ICVs, such as the Intelligent and Connected Vehicles—Operational Design Condition for Automated Driving System (GB/T 45312-2025), Intelligent and Connected Vehicle—General Technical Requirements for Automated Driving System (GB/T 44721- 2024), and the Intelligent and connected vehicle—Methods and Requirements of Road Test for Automated Driving Functions (GB/T 44719-2024), etc.

Besides national-level policies and standards, there are many local polices and provisions regarding ICVs or AVs.

Under the current regulatory frameworks for ICVs or AVs, the Level 2 vehicles of the ICV Levels have been widely sold in the end customer market. Level 3 and above of ICVs or AVs are still in the road testing or demonstration application stage. For instance, the specific application scenario of the demonstration application in the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone includes operating qualified ICVs as intelligent taxis, intelligent trucks, intelligent buses, intelligent delivery vehicles, and intelligent cleaning vehicles. Road tests and demonstration application of such ICVs or AVs are limited to sections of typical public roads selected and announced by the responsible departments.

So far, there are no specific regulations regarding liability for damages or insurance for the operation of ICVs or AVs in China. General laws and regulations on tort liability, product liability, transportation accident liability, insurance, etc., apply in relation to the operation of ICVs or AVs in the same way as in relation to other vehicles.

Therefore, in principle, the driver of an ICV or AV is the party primarily responsible and liable for the operation of the vehicle and any related (traffic) accidents due to tort liability and/ or traffic accident liability. In case there is a product defect in the ICV or AV resulting in such accidents, the manufacturer and/ or the seller of the ICV or AV shall assume product liability towards the respective damaged parties, unless they can prove that the defect did not exist at the time when the product was put into circulation, the level of science and technology at the time when the product put into circulation was not sufficient to detect the existence of the defect, or the accident was caused by a third party (e.g. cyberattacks). The liability of the insurance company shall be determined according to the agreed insurance policies.

Currently, there is no explicit legal basis under PRC law that would support the lawfulness of autonomous decisions based on the principle of “an act of rescue”.

There are no specific and separate legal grounds for collecting external data and data from unspecified subjects for system improvement and learning, whether during testing or while in operation, but the general data security and data protection laws apply.

In principle, if the concerned external data does not constitute important data and is general data, it can be collected freely. By reference to the Several Provisions on Administration of Automobile Data Security (Trial) (“Automobile Data Provisions”), in the context of automobiles, important data include: 

• Geographical information, flows of people or vehicles and other data in respect of any important sensitive area such as a military administrative zone, national defense science and technology development entity, or Party or government agency at or above the county level; 
• Traffic volume, logistics and other data that reflect performance of the economy; 
• Operating data of a vehicle charging network; 
• Video or image data collected outside of a vehicle including human facial information, license plate information, etc.; 
• Personal information involving more than 100,000 personal information subjects; and 
• Other data that may lead to endangerment of national security or public interests, or infringement of the lawful rights and interests of an individual or organization as determined by the national cyberspace authority in conjunction with relevant authorities, including the development and reform authority, the authority for industry and information technology, the public security authority and the transport authority under the State Council.

If the data from unspecified subjects is related to natural persons, consent from the natural persons is required, or the data should be anonymized in a way that specific individuals cannot be identified, thus exempting the need for consent from the data subjects.

Where the relevant data constitute important data (with telemetrics data having a relatively high likelihood of being deemed important data), according to the Automobile Data Provisions, AV operators are obligated to report to the provincial-level cyberspace administration and relevant departments on the annual situation of automotive data security management. This includes the types, scale, purpose, and necessity of processing automotive data. In cases involving the provision of such important data to overseas entities, in addition to supplementing matters related to outbound data transfers in the aforementioned report, AV operators are also required to pass a security assessment organized by the national cyberspace administration in conjunction with relevant State Council departments. During the security assessment, clear information regarding the purpose, scope, methods, and types and scale of data must be provided.

In recent years, automotive autonomous driving technology and related industries have continued to develop rapidly in China. In 2020, the PRC National Development and Reform Commission and eleven other ministries and commissions jointly issued the “Intelligent Vehicle Innovation and Development Strategy” proposing a strategic vision of realizing the large-scale production of conditionally autonomous intelligent vehicles by 2025 and realizing the market-oriented application of highly autonomous intelligent vehicles in specific environments. Therefore, we foresee the trend of an overall continuing development over the coming years in all aspects related to the ICV/ AV industry.

Accordingly, many local governments have granted incentives and subsidies to promote the production of ICVs and AVs. For instance, the Science, Technology, and Economic Commission of Shanghai Pudong New Area issued a policy that explicitly supports Tesla in accelerating its localization layout in China and promoting the export of Chinese- manufactured Tesla vehicles. The government of Qiantang District in Hangzhou City provides subsidies to manufacturers of ICVs amounting to 70% of the road tests costs. Additionally, the government of Wuhan East Lake High-tech Development Zone offers incentives of 10% of the project’s capital expenditure to qualified ICV enterprises, up to 200 million RMB.

The government’s encouraging policies have, thus, encouraged the set up of a large number of ICV/ AV enterprises and projects. For instance, Tesla established an energy storage super factory in Shanghai. Chery has also invested tens of billions of RMB to construct several super factories related to ICVs in Wuhu, Anhui.

Despite the above-mentioned ICVs/ AVs related regulations and standards, there are still many blank fields and uncertainties e.g., regarding technical standards, testing methods, liabilities, insurance in relation to ICVs/ AVs and autonomous driving behaviors. We expect that more development in the legal regime with new rules and regulations will be seen in the next years.