China to crack down on AI abuse and sensational short-form dramas until the end of the year

Regulation of face and voice theft... 75,000 violative films removed this year

(Beijing = Yonhap News) Correspondent Jong-gu Han = The Chinese government has launched a special crackdown on short-form dramas using artificial intelligence (AI), including low-quality and sensational content.

This is a measure to respond to problems such as lowering the quality of content and copyright infringement as the production of short-form dramas increases rapidly due to the spread of AI technology.

According to China's official Xinhua News Agency on the 8th, the State Administration of Radio and Television, a broadcasting and Internet supervisory agency, announced that it would conduct a special crackdown on short-form dramas until the 31st of next month to prevent the spread of low-quality and uniform content using AI technology.

The main targets of crackdown are harmful content related to children, scenes that stimulate sensationalism, content that promotes extreme confrontation or encourages materialism, and works that seriously undermine family ethics.

In particular, acts that use AI technology to use other people's faces or voices without permission, as well as works that have not been registered or reviewed in accordance with regulations, will also be cracked down on.

We also decided to strengthen management of the content distribution process.

Low-quality content included in drama titles and promotional videos was overhauled, and the practice of repeatedly distributing the same work by changing only the title or main character name was also subject to crackdowns.

Online platforms have also improved their practice of recommending works with similar content on the home screen or in popularity rankings.

The General Directorate of Photocopying announced that this year it had expelled 75,000 short-form dramas from online platforms that violated regulations due to low-quality, harmful content and copyright infringement, and sanctioned about 1,500 related accounts.

According to data released by the General Administration of Photocopying in September, the number of short-form dramas released in China from January to August this year was 430,000, 13 times more than last year's total, and AI works accounted for more than 90% of them.

Through this special crackdown, the authorities plan to strengthen the content management responsibility of online platforms and encourage qualitative growth in the short-form drama industry by supporting the production of excellent works.