China’s internet regulator is tightening oversight of short video content by introducing mandatory labels for AI-generated material, promotional content, and staged scenes.
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) has announced the introduction of unified short video content labeling rules for online platforms. Under the new requirements, publishers uploading videos must select one of six mandatory labels, including tags indicating AI-generated content, promotional information, fictional or staged content, or content reflecting personal opinions.
The new measures are part of a broader campaign targeting misinformation and misleading content. Since the beginning of the year, Chinese platforms have cleaned up more than 520,000 non-compliant short videos, while over 68,000 accounts violating regulations were penalized. The crackdown notably targeted staged fake content presented as authentic events.
Since March, major Chinese platforms including Douyin, Kuaishou, Tencent, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili, Weibo, as well as Alibaba, JD.com, and Baidu services, have participated in pilot testing of the labeling system. By the end of May, the companies are expected to complete upgrades to their content publishing and review mechanisms.
According to the new rules, users uploading videos must choose one of six mandatory labels: “contains fictional content,” “contains AI-generated content,” “contains marketing information,” “content is reposted,” “content reflects personal opinions,” or “no labeling required.” The latter option is intended for authentic life-recorded short videos without staged elements and will not appear on the video page.
The Chinese regulator has also instructed platforms to review both newly uploaded and existing short videos, adding or correcting missing labels where necessary. Publishers and platforms failing to comply with the requirements may face penalties and public exposure of violations.
Source: China Daily, Futubull
