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Beijing market watchdog has recently released guidelines to ban fabricating, modifying, deleting or blocking consumers' comments to better protect consumers' legitimate rights and interests on online trading platforms.

In a bid to urge and guide online trading platforms to implement their responsibilities of management, protect the rights and interests of small-and micro business operators and consumers on the platforms, Beijing Municipal Administration for Market Regulation released a series of regulation guidelines covering business operations, transparency, and restrictions on certain goods, Beijing Daily reported on Sunday.

In order to protect consumers' genuine feedback on services and products provided on the platforms, in addition to the ban on fabricating, modifying, deleting or blocking consumers' comments, the guidelines prohibit displaying information in a misleading manner such as prioritizing positive reviews over negative ones.

The guideline also prohibits online trade operators from coercing or indirectly pressuring consumers to agree to the collection and use of information that is not directly related to business activities.

Besides, explicit and separate consumer consent must be obtained when collecting and using sensitive information such as their personal biometric data, medical and health records, financial accounts, and personal whereabouts.

To tackle the problem that some business operators send unsolicited marketing messages, the guidelines mandate that commercial messages cannot be sent without prior consumer consent.

When sending commercial messages, the senders must disclose their real identities, contact information and offer a clear, simple and cost-free opt-out mechanism. If a consumer refuses explicitly, the sender must immediately stop sending messages and must not resend them under a different name.

With the growing prevalence of virtual livestreamers in product marketing, the guidelines require that virtual avatars created by using technologies such as artificial intelligence, digital visuals, virtual reality and speech syntheses and are engaged in livestream marketing, must be clearly labeled.

Besides, in order to avoid service products being "automatically renewed" without consumers' recognition, online business operators must remind consumers before automatic service extensions in a prominent way to protect consumers' rights and interests.

Global Times