Filed under platform-obligations
Every brief tagged "platform-obligations".
- § 01 · MINORS
Draft State Council Provisions on Minors' Internet Use: A Ban on Stranger Social Networking, Minors' Mode by Default Under 16, and Filing for Devices and Platforms
On September 18, 2026, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) released the draft State Council Provisions on Ensuring Minors' Healthy and Safe Use of the Internet for public comment. Comments closed October 17, 2026. DCC has translated the 25 articles, the notice, and the CAC's Explanation in full. Against the 2024 Regulations on the Protection of Minors in Cyberspace, the draft adds five things. It bans online social networking with strangers for minors (except self-supporting 16- and 17-year-olds), and extends the virtual-intimacy ban from AI companions to all network services. It makes minors' mode the only way to serve under-16s with audio and video, live-streaming, games, social networking, and AI services that may affect minors' cognition. It turns minor-user identification into a stand-alone duty, with methods that include one-time facial verification and behavioral recognition. It reaches smart terminal manufacturers and app distribution platforms. And it creates a minors' mode filing system: providers that offer a minors' mode file with the provincial cyberspace administration, while platforms identified as having a very large number of minor users and a significant impact on minors file with the national cyberspace administration through the provincial office and report on their minors' mode. Fines reach 10 times illegal gains or RMB 1 million. The effective date is blank, but the year reads 2026.
- § 02 · MINORS
CAC Opens the First Identification Round for 'Article 20' Platforms: Who Must Self-Report a Large Minor Audience, and by When
On October 16, 2026, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) launched the first round of identification under the Measures for Identifying Network Platform Service Providers with a Very Large Number of Minor Users and a Significant Impact on Minors (国信办发文〔2026〕2号, effective April 1, 2026). DCC translates the announcement and its work guide in full. Platforms that meet the numeric thresholds must self-assess and file within 20 working days, which on DCC's count lands in mid-November 2026. The thresholds are 10 million registered or 1 million monthly active users for minor-directed services, and 10 million registered or 1 million monthly active minor users for general-audience services. Platforms caught by a six-factor impact test are expected to file too. Paper filings go to the provincial cyberspace administration. Platforms on the final list take on the extra duties of Article 20 of the Regulations on the Protection of Minors in Cyberspace: minors-impact assessments, a minors' mode, an independent external supervisory body, platform rules, and an annual social responsibility report. For serious breaches of two of them (the impact assessment, and cutting off harmful on-platform businesses), Article 54 allows fines of up to RMB 50 million or 5% of the previous year's turnover.