China’s New Internet Rules Follow Baidu Probe
BEIJING—China’s internet regulator has issued new rules for online search and advertising, about six weeks after it opened an investigation of Chinese search giant Baidu Inc.’s practices.
On Saturday, the Cyberspace Administration of China announced that search companies must provide “objective, fair and authoritative results” that should not harm the rights and interests of the nation, the public and other legal organizations.
rule also encourages service to identify and label paid advertisements clearly distinguishing them from regular search results and to limit the number of paid ads on each page.
An unnamed CAC official said the new rules came in response to Internet users’ longstanding complaints about the ambiguity between paid advertisements and “natural search results,” according to a Q & A posted on the regulator’s website
“some search results include illegal content as rumors, obscenity, violence, killings and terror .; some search results lacks objectivity and fairness, which violates the company’s moral standards that mislead and affect the public judgment,” the official said.
“These problems annihilate Internet ecology, disrupting communication orders of Internet information and undermine the public interest,” the official added.
governor also called for timely reports and cache information from service providers when they find “illegal” content from search results, such as content that threatens national security or related to terrorism.
the new rules come on the heels of a study initiated by the Government of Baidu medical advertising practice after the death of Wei Zexi, a college student with cancer that had taken a therapy found through an online ad on Baidu.
Mr. Wei’s death had triggered widespread criticism from state media and Internet users, who complained about the murky online world of health information in a country where search one company dominates. A large number of Chinese prefer to turn to other patients in online forums for medical advice, which has made Baidu the main go-to site for medical information.
The regulator had given Baidu a deadline of 31 May to comply with the changes, which included clearly identifies promotions and limiting ad results for only 30% of each page search results. It had also said the amount an advertiser has paid to the search engine should not factor in search results. Baidu told the regulator it had implemented these changes on time.
In a statement in response to the new CAC rules, Baidu said it “will be in full compliance with relevant laws and regulations as outlined by the CAC.” It added that it has worked closely with public authorities and users to provide objective and authoritative results.
on Sunday, Baidu president Zhang Yaqin said at a World Economic Forum panel in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin that after Baidu crisis in the last six months, the company is working to rebuild trust. Baidu will make search results more reliable, and the company recognizes it bears more responsibility now that it is a large company, he says.
-Yang Jie and Eva Dou contributed to this article.
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