BEIJING—China’s legislature has approved a wide-ranging anti-terrorism law that could force foreign tech firms to hand over sensitive information and paves the way for the military to engage in counterterror operations overseas.

Beijing says the law, passed late Sunday, is necessary to prevent terror attacks at home and abroad. But critics worry it could be used to gain access to proprietary or personal information and places further restrictions on the media and other outlets.

The law has drawn pointed criticism from both business and rights groups since it was released in draft form. It also comes less than a week after a French journalist was ordered expelled for reporting on terrorism topics that angered Chinese authorities.

“While the Chinese authorities do have a legitimate duty in safeguarding their citizens from violent attacks, passing this law will have some negative repercussions for human rights,” said Patrick Poon, a Hong Kong-based researcher at Amnesty International.

“The definition of terrorism and extremism in this law is very vague and ‘extremist’ behaviour could include any criticism of policies, laws and regulations.”

In March, U.S. President Barack Obama spoke out about draft provisions that would force foreign tech companies to give the Chinese authorities “back door” access to their products, share encryption codes and store data in China.

“We have made it very clear to them that this is something they are going to have to change if they are to do business with the United States,” Obama told the Reuters news agency.

The final version of the law seems to step back those demands, but still stipulates that companies must release “technical interfaces” and assist with decryption should security agencies deem it necessary to avert or investigate a terrorist attack — language unlikely to appease businesses.

Joerg Wuttke, president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, said his group “recognizes the positive developments in terms of removing the language on encryption review and server/data localization in the final draft,” but said they remain concerned about intellectual property rights and censorship.

Chinese officials have cast the new rules as necessary and in line with what other countries, including the United States, are doing.

“Not only in China, but also in many places internationally, growing numbers of terrorists are using the Internet to promote and incite terrorism and are using the Internet to organize, plan and carry out terrorist acts,” said Li Shouwei, an official, at a press conference on Sunday.

The passage of the bill comes amid a rancorous debate about how China defines terrorism and how it plans to fight it.

China’s top leaders maintain the country is engaged in a domestic war on terror, including groups linked to a minority Muslim community, known as Uighurs, in the country’s far northwest.

Foreign scholars and rights organizations question the extent to which local groups are linked to terrorists elsewhere. They counter that Uighur grievances are mostly about government-sanctioned repression — a charge Chinese authorities strongly oppose.

After the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris, China’s President Xi Jinping and Foreign Minister Wang Yi both railed against a Western “double standard” on terrorism.

On Friday, China’s Foreign Ministry confirmed that a French journalist, Ursula Gauthier, will be expelled from China for questioning the official line on terrorism.

In a Nov. 18 essay, Gauthier said China’s post-Paris expression of solidarity had “ulterior motives,” namely a desire to secure support for its anti-terror plans at home. After a weeks-long smear campaign in the state-controlled press, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said her writing “emboldened” terrorists.

Gauthier’s expulsion will do little to curb concerns about the law’s potential impact on human rights.

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The Chinese government keeps a tight grip on information about violent attacks. Reporters are often blocked from reporting in Xinjiang; the state-controlled press withholds details for week, or even months.

Chinese citizens who raise questions about the government’s handling of unrest in Xinjiang — including scholar Ilham Tohti and lawyer Pu Zhiqiang — have been jailed for speaking out.

The anti-terrorism law also is troubling because it further criminalizes posting about terrorism online, said Amnesty’s Poon.

“This law could give the authorities even more tools in censoring unwelcome information and crafting their own narrative in how the ‘war on terror’ is being waged.”

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