Lately, the State Administration for Industry and Commerce ("SAIC") has drawn up the Interim Measures for Punishment against Illegal and Dishonest Conduct in Online Transactions (Draft for Comment) (the "Draft for Comment") for public consultation by December 13, 2017.
The Draft for Comment, comprising a total of 24 articles in six chapters, covers serious illegal and dishonest behavior, minor illegal and dishonest behavior, administration of the list of parties with illegal and dishonest conduct, disciplinary measures, etc. The Draft for Comment provides for a series of disciplinary actions, such as making information about illegalities known to the public, publishing consumption warning, requesting to block the website in question, cutting off the connection services and imposing technical limits, and adds that those business operators dealing in commodities online shall be labelled as the targets under major supervision and administration if they have been punished for their seriously illegal conduct, and shall also be subject to strengthened regulation offline during the period of punishment. Furthermore, the Draft for Comment contains targeted provisions against parties with illegal or dishonest act that flow between various online transaction platforms, requiring efforts to set up a mechanism to have information about those parties with illegal and dishonest act shared between the said platforms and publish their relevant information through different ways.