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Non-Tech : CAOL: The Chinese AOL and Internet Lottery -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tylcar who wrote (436)	6/8/1999 9:19:00 PM
From: WEBNATURAL	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 720

China Issues New Regulations For Internet Cafes (1/21/1999) China has tightened restrictions on Internet use, ordering Internet cafes that offer access to web surfers to register with the police, according to the January 21 Tianjin Ribao (Tianjin Daily). Such bars and cafes, growing in popularity in major cities in China, have been one of the few ways Chinese Internet users could receive e-mail or surf the net anonymously. In January, four central government ministries, the Public Security Bureau, the Ministry of Information Industry (MII), the Ministry of Culture, and the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, jointly issued a circular instituting stricter requirements for Internet cafe operators. According to the new rules, only Internet access providers approved by the state information technology regulatory departments, e.g. the MII, are eligible for an Internet cafe operator's license. Any Internet cafe applicant must register first with the local public security bureau, which will review and have security checkups, according to the new rules. No one will be allowed to operate without licenses from the three separate agencies, the local public security bureau, the local industry and commerce administration bureau, and the local telecommunications bureau. Internet cafe operators are now also prohibited from providing any form of computer games to customers. This prohibition is an effort by the Ministry of Culture to reduce juvenile delinquency and truancy. The new rules also ban the leasing or transference of the operation of Internet cafes. Online cafes also must now prevent any customers from participating in any online activities considered harmful to state security, social stability, or other people's interests. In a break from the past, Internet cafe operators under the new regulations will be held personally responsible for failure to monitor, report, and suspend online access to suspect violators of state laws and regulations. Prior to the new rules, Internet providers were not responsible for the content viewed by users. In order to enforce the new rules, operators are now required to appoint at least a part-time security administrator to oversee the surfing at their Internet cafes. The new regulations came as reaction to criticisms that some Internet cafe operators offer online gambling and computer games with lewd content, according to the joint circular. Not one of the major nationwide Chinese news publications carried the story today, except for the Gongren Ribao (Workers Daily), although even the Gongren Ribao did not reveal substantive details of the new regulations. Not one of the top ten most popular news web sites in China, including Sohu, Sinanet, Chinabyte, Netease (based in Guangzhou), Shanghai Online, and Shenzhen Online, revealed news of the new policies either. The government has encouraged the rapid spread of Internet use in China, and China now has an estimated 1.2 million Internet logons, each with multiple users. However, the government also closely monitors China's internet users. On Wednesday, a court in China sentenced a Shanghai software entrepreneur, Lin Hai, to two years in jail for giving the e-mail addresses of 30,000 Chinese computer users to a pro-democracy journal published on the Internet by Chinese expatriate dissidents. See related article(s): Behind The Boom: Internet Use in China China's New Securities Law Expected To Include Internet Monitoring Safeguards *ChinaOnline does not endorse external web sites.