If illegal information appears in the WeChat group, the group owner will be sentenced to eight years in prison? We checked the regulations.

Recently, a message of "WeChat new group rules, the group owner has great responsibility, be careful to be sentenced" spread on social platforms, and there are even rumors that "illegal information appears in the group, and the group owner is sentenced to a maximum of eight years".

The background of "Shanghai Internet Rumors" has also received a lot of news, and I hope to verify this.

The reporter's investigation found that there are no norms or laws and regulations to treat "Internet group owners" and "Internet group members" differently. Because as internet users, both group owners and group members must abide by laws and regulations; If you break the law, you will be punished by the law.

At the same time, the Regulations on the Administration of Internet Group Information Services issued by the National Internet Information Office and officially implemented on June 8, 20 17 clearly stipulates that the providers and users of Internet group information services who violate the regulations shall be dealt with by the relevant departments in accordance with relevant laws and regulations.

Insiders pointed out that this means that different violations correspond to different punishments, and the statement that "the maximum sentence is eight years" is not accurate.

"Family rules": "group owners" and "group friends" must abide by them.

It is found that all social platforms have corresponding usage norms for groups. Users must know and agree when registering.

Taking WeChat as an example, the Specification for the Use of WeChat Personal Account (hereinafter referred to as the "WeChat Specification") can be said to be a "family rule" formulated by Tencent for WeChat. The WeChat Specification clearly states that "WeChat users shall not violate existing laws and regulations when using WeChat accounts".

This nearly 6,000-word "WeChat Specification" lists all kinds of violations, and makes it clear that the founders, managers (commonly known as "group owners") and implementers (either group owners or ordinary group friends) of WeChat groups will face treatment once violations occur.

Relevant provisions in the WeChat personal account usage specification ↑

So, which behaviors are illegal?

Wechat specification has specific instructions. Related to "WeChat group", it generally involves "data acquisition, use" and "content".

In terms of "data acquisition and use", the WeChat Specification clearly stipulates that it is not allowed to "copy, store, use or transmit the data of other WeChat users without the explicit consent of other WeChat users or without truthfully disclosing the purpose and scope of use to other WeChat users"; It is not allowed to "ask other WeChat users to enjoy and submit personal information before they can use a service or engage in an activity, such as fortune telling after filling in personal information and joining group chat after revealing personal information".

There are many regulations related to content, including content infringement, pornography, gambling, endangering platform security, involving black and terrorism, illegal articles, fraudulent information, false information, inducing sharing, attracting attention and so on.

In order to explain what can't be published, the WeChat specification also gives examples, some of which are just rumors or words that often appear in WeChat groups or friends:

Shocked: Eating pork in China is tantamount to suicide! ! ""Please tell your acquaintances not to eat seafood in the near future. Please forward "as soon as possible" false information that is likely to be judged to disturb social order and cause or may cause public panic. Information with the words "I'm not from China", "Please kindly forward", "I'm safe all my life after forwarding", "I'm crazy" and "I'll turn around" is suspected of inducing sharing and attention.

In response to these illegal contents, WeChat specification is clear:

For WeChat personal accounts that violate this specification, "once found, Tencent will delete or block the violation information, warn, restrict or prohibit the use of some or all functions until the permanent title, and have the right to announce the processing results";

If it violates the rules in the WeChat group, "Tencent will delete or block the violation information, warn, restrict or prohibit the use of some or all functions until the permanent title, and has the right to announce the processing results according to the circumstances".

Wechat also provides a channel for users to say "no" to inappropriate content. On the one hand, the group owner can manage the group, including removing the group friends who make inappropriate comments and conduct inappropriate behaviors from the group chat, and dissolving the group if necessary; On the other hand, group owners and other group friends can also enter the complaint page through the WeChat client to report complaints about related behaviors and information.

"National Law": Management Responsibility of Group Owners ≠ Legal Responsibility of Offenders

At the national level, the Regulations on the Administration of Internet Group Information Services (hereinafter referred to as the Regulations) can be called the "national law" of Internet group management.

According to this regulation, "Internet group" refers to the cyberspace established by Internet users through Internet websites, mobile Internet applications and other platforms for online information exchange among groups, such as WeChat group, QQ group, Weibo group, Post Bar group, Momo group and Alipay group chat. Internet group information service providers as mentioned in the Regulations refer to platforms that provide Internet group information services; Users of Internet group information services include group founders, managers and members.

However, the "Regulations" did not put forward that "whoever builds the group is responsible" and "who manages it is responsible", but pointed out in Article 9: "Internet group promoters and managers should fulfill the responsibility of group management, standardize group network behavior and information release according to laws and regulations, user agreements and platform conventions, and build a civilized and orderly network group space. Internet group members should abide by laws and regulations, interact with each other in a civilized way and express themselves rationally when participating in group information exchange. Internet group information service providers should provide necessary functional authority for group creators and managers to conduct group management. "

The Regulations on the Administration of Internet Group Information Services describes the responsibilities of different subjects of Internet groups.

It can be seen that the "Regulations" have made it clear that both group owners and group friends have the responsibility to maintain a civilized and orderly network group space.

In fact, some netizens interpret the above provisions as "once a group member violates laws and regulations, the legal responsibility of the group owner will be investigated". Wang Weiguo, a professor at China University of Political Science and Law, once said through the media that this is a misunderstanding. He explained that the "Regulations" mainly require group owners to bear the necessary management responsibilities for the information published in the group. "The group mainly supervises the information uploaded in the group to prevent anyone from using the Internet group you manage to spread illegal activities such as endangering national security, defaming others, endangering public order or engaging in pyramid schemes."

It should be noted that the management responsibility of group owners is different from the legal responsibility of violators. The management responsibility of the group owner includes not only the obligation to serve the members of the group, but also the obligation to maintain public order. Generally speaking, if the latter obligation is violated, for example, the illegal information of group members is not cleared in time, the administrative department may require rectification, or the group service may be stopped because of poor rectification. According to the law of our country, only the illegal information in the group has caused serious harmful consequences, and he is intentional or negligent, will he be investigated for the corresponding legal responsibility.

Yang Xiaojun, a professor at the Political and Legal Department of the Central Party School, also said that the management responsibility of group owners is not to "let the group owners also bear the responsibility of group members violating laws and regulations". He pointed out that in an Internet group, there are not only owners as the responsible subjects, but also four subjects, including owners, participants/spokespersons (group friends), network platform providers and relevant authorities, and these four subjects bear corresponding responsibilities respectively. The so-called "whoever builds the group is responsible" means that the group owner bears the corresponding responsibility, not the full responsibility, and it is not the "export" for other responsible subjects to transfer their responsibilities.

In addition, regarding the responsibility of group owners, there was a rumor in 2020: "Any WeChat group with more than 100 people obviously involves pornographic pictures or videos, and the group owners and managers will be sentenced to administrative detention for 7- 15 days."

At that time, Jiangsu network police rumored through the official Weibo that "the public security organs will not simply take whether there is pornographic information in the group as the punishment standard, but as the group owner, they should promptly take actions such as reminding, dissuading and moving out of the group chat after discovering that someone in the group spreads obscene pornographic, gambling, violent and bloody information. Only those who fail to perform their supervision and management duties need to bear corresponding legal responsibilities."

In fact, when the "Regulations" were promulgated, the relevant person in charge of the National Internet Information Office also said that if the group owner needs to bear the responsibility, the platform side will first impose penalties: "The platform side will take management measures such as lowering the credit rating, suspending the management authority and canceling the qualification for building a group according to law. At the same time, the platform should establish a blacklist management system to blacklist groups, founders, managers and members who have serious violations of laws and regulations. "

It is not difficult to find that the group owner does bear the management responsibility of the Internet group, but it does not mean that the group is mainly responsible for the problem information in the group. Moreover, when expressing the responsibility of the group owner, whether it is "family rules" or "national laws", it refers to disposal according to law, and there is no provision of "will be sentenced" or even "sentenced to eight years".

Case: Someone in the group broke the law. Why do different owners have different "treatments"?

Wang Weiguo also reminded that if there is illegal information in the group, there are two criteria to judge whether the group owner has the responsibility: one is the damage caused by neglect of management, and the other is whether there is subjective fault in the management process. Subjectively intentional or negligent, they should bear corresponding administrative and criminal responsibilities, and those who cause damage should also bear the liability for compensation. In other words, only when the group owner discovers that the members of the group violate the law and regulations and fail to take measures to cause certain consequences, they need to bear corresponding legal responsibilities.

This can be verified by related cases.

Recently, Guangzhou Internet Court disclosed two cases related to WeChat group. At first glance, the content is very similar: in order to facilitate the property management, the staff of the property management company established the owner communication WeChat group, and the users in the group abused others.

Among them, Li, a staff member of a property company, as the group owner, turned a blind eye to the abusive behavior in the group management for more than a year and was indifferent to the help of the insulted person. Zhang, the insulted person, filed an infringement lawsuit against several owners who made abusive remarks in the group. The court's effective judgment found that the behavior of the relevant owners constituted an infringement of the right of reputation, and ordered a written apology and compensation of 2,000 yuan for mental damages. Zhang also believes that the misconduct of the property company is an important reason for its reputation damage, so he sued the property company to the court and demanded an apology and compensation of 20,000 yuan for mental damages. After trial, Guangzhou Internet Court held that Li's act of creating WeChat group was an act of performing his job duties, so the resulting civil liability should be borne by Li's property company.

In another case, after the members of WeChat group swore, the owner Zhao, as the representative of the property company, dissuaded them in time and dissolved the WeChat group after the dissuasion was invalid. The court ruled that Zhao and his property management company were not responsible. However, group friends insulted others and were still sentenced to bear tort liability according to law.

Li Peng, the presiding judge, said that the difference between the two cases mainly lies in whether the owners have fulfilled their management responsibilities in time. In the first case, the group owner turns a blind eye to the negative information that lasts for more than one year in the group; In the second case, the group owner stopped the negative words in time, organized offline communication and handled them in time, so the court made different judgments on the two cases.

The judge said that WeChat group is an important part of cyberspace. Members of the group should express their opinions in the WeChat group in a civilized and orderly manner and consciously practice the socialist core values of civilization, harmony and friendliness. The group mainly attaches great importance to and correctly exercises the management authority, fulfills the management responsibility of WeChat group, and actively maintains a clear and orderly cyberspace.