Users have to use their real names in cryptoactive information services. This regulation is subject to a public consultation until November 2nd, 2018.
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) presented a regulatory proposal for blockchain users. CAC wants them to provide real information on the servers which work with that kind of technology.
Service providers related to blockchain would require users to provide their identification card numbers, their mobile phone number and their real names in order to login on the platform. They must also report any transgression committed, if that is the case. This approach is in public consultation, which will culminate on November 2nd, 2018.
The name of the project is “Regulation for the management of information services of blockchain”. CAC published the announcement on its official website last Friday, without indicating when the regulations would take effect.
Local media detail this project is the first set of rules made for blockchain industry, whose provides privacy to its users. Blockchain technology ensures cryptocurrencies transactions security.
Blockchain service providers are the “entities or nodes” which provide information or technical support services based on this technology, indicates the 23-article document. These companies are the ones that should require users to provide true information.
The way
Service providers must complete a mandatory registration before reaching ten days from the beginning of their operations. Chinese authorities will conduct an annual audit to monitor the different companies and also the compliment of the process.
Online information services based on the chain of blocks, such as news portals, medical care, or education, will be reviewed and approved by the authorities before being registered.
If this regulation is approved, companies will be obliged to censor the content considered by the authorities as a “danger to national security” or information “prohibited by laws and regulations”.
In past months, censored information was published through different cryptoactive networks. The proposed regulation would be a way to avoid these situations.
Last April, activists from the MeToo organization used blockchain Ethereum to disseminate a letter denouncing a case of sexual abuse that occurred at Peking University, more than two decades ago. In July, the Ethereum network was used to publish a research article that revealed the low quality of medicines manufactured by the Chinese laboratory Changchun Changsheng Biotechnology.
It can be pointed out as antecedents of this regulation the prohibitions that the government of China implemented on some activities related to cryptocurrencies such as the impossibility of trading using cryptoactive.
Specialists in cryptocurrencies issues remember that blockchain data cannot be deleted or modified. But this aspect goes against Chinese laws. Hence, the subject will continue in debate.
By María Victoria Rodríguez
