Hong Kong to widen access to corporate executives’ data to professionals to enhance compliance work, deter money laundering

Hong Kong’s government plans to allow a longer list of professionals to gain access to the personal data of corporate directors and executives, in a refinement of a plan to crack down on money laundering and financial misdemeanour.

The Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau (FSTB) would add practising accountants, lawyers, bankers to a list of “specified persons” who can get access to the personal data of corporate directors and executives, said the FSTB Secretary Christopher Hui Ching-yu.

The group of “specified persons,” including securities firms, insurers, real property agents, and license holders of stored-value facilities, can apply to Hong Kong’s Registrar of Companies to gain full access to the home addresses and Hong Kong identity card (HKID) numbers of corporate directors and executives listed in the Companies Registry.

The inclusion of “these organisations to the list of ‘specified persons’ would help ensure the robustness of governance of Hong Kong’s financial and commercial sectors,” Hui said in a blog post on the FSTB’s website, adding that the extension will be executed in three phases starting in May. “This would also maintain the high efficiency of [the city’s] anti-money-laundering regime.”

The move makes the personal data of corporate executives accessible to more professionals. Members of the public not on the “specified persons” list can only obtain correspondence addresses and partial HKID numbers, according to a

to address privacy concerns over doxxing and abuses of personal data.