Representative committee members discuss the "social death" caused by cyber violence——
To avoid "everyone is in danger", there is still a need for systematic legal regulation
Our reporter Lu Yue
"Victims are declared 'social death' due to cyber violence, even extreme events, which is distressing." Lu Man, deputy to the National People's Congress and chairman of the Tianhe Ecological Agriculture Professional Cooperative in Jianhu County, Jiangsu Province, talked about the attention in recent years. of cyber violence incidents.
In cyberspace, when will the "buttons" stop hurting people?
At the two sessions, many representatives and committee members focused their attention on the topic of curbing cyber violence.
"Social death" is a "big thing" for the parties involved
"'Social death' is a 'big thing' for the parties involved." On February 21, Miao Shengming, director of the First Procuratorate of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, said at a press conference of the Supreme People's Procuratorate.
On the same day, the Supreme People's Procuratorate issued a guiding case, and the "Hangzhou woman's case of rumours and derailment of express delivery", which had attracted widespread attention, was selected.
This case once aroused strong social concern and once again sparked heated discussions among the representatives.
"People don't do violence in their daily lives, but they can become abusers online," said Luhmann. "In cyberbullying, victims often cannot escape the abuse and harassment they experience, some of which are even more severe than traditional violence. Behaviour is more intense."
According to data released by the "Statistical Report on Internet Development in China", as of December 2021, the number of netizens in my country reached 1.032 billion, with an average of 28.5 hours per week online.
According to the survey data of the "Youth Cybersecurity Research" conducted by the China Youth Research Center in 2021, 17.4% of young people have suffered cyber violence while surfing the Internet.
"At present, there are various forms of cyber violence in cyberspace, which infringe on netizens' right to reputation, portrait rights and other personality rights, and seriously affect social order and safety, especially the healthy growth of the young generation." Member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Wang Xuekun, secretary of the Party Committee of the China Youth Research Center, said.
National Model Worker and State Grid Zhejiang Zhuji Power Supply Company He Bei said that some netizens even maliciously smeared the innovation achievements of the Model Worker, affecting the society's positive evaluation of innovation and creation.
Zhao Ping, deputy to the National People's Congress and a riveting fitter at the Aviation Industry Shaanxi Aircraft Parts Factory, brought "Suggestions on Preventing Personal Injury Caused by Soft Violence on the Internet" this year.
"Whether it's the case of 'Hangzhou woman was slandered by a courier' or 'the grandfather and grandson photos were slandered by an old husband and a young wife', the object of the slander and the defendant do not know at all." He said, "Every one of us has It is possible to be violated like this. If everyone is in danger, the sense of security is reduced.”
There is no systematic legal regulation on cyber violence
Wang Xuekun's investigation found that some media and online platforms have a weak sense of social responsibility, some media and platforms pursue the "eyeball effect" for the benefit of traffic, publish false or one-sided reports, and the censorship of online platforms is not strict, all of which are cyber violence. Fuel the flames.
This year, Commissioner Wang Xuekun brought the "Proposal on Specially Formulating an Anti-Cyber Violence Law", suggesting that specialized and systematic centralized legislation should be adopted to deal with cyber violence.
This is also the suggestion of Luhmann's representative this year.
She believes that it is necessary to further clarify the civil liability, public security punishment and criminal liability of illegal acts of cyber violence through special legislation, and to improve the legal awareness and rights protection concept of the whole society against cyber violence.
In 2013, the two high schools issued the "Interpretation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in Handling Criminal Cases such as Defamation Using Information Networks", responding to the relevant situation and clarifying the criminalization criteria.
my country's Civil Code, Criminal Law, Cybersecurity Law, and Public Security Administration Punishment Law also contain relevant provisions on cyber violence.
However, some representatives believe that these regulations are still relatively scattered and not systematic, and there is also a lack of coordination between the provisions of different laws, making it difficult to deal with complex cyber violence issues.
"Currently cyber violence is not a legal concept," said Zhou Shihong, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and vice president of the Anhui Lawyers Association, "but this does not mean that cyber violence is not subject to legal sanctions. If the means constitute illegal activities, such as insults, defamation, and provoking troubles, cyber violence can still be decomposed into other illegal phenomena and illegal acts, and the perpetrators can be punished.”
Committee member Zhou Shihong believes that it is unrealistic to formulate and promulgate a cyber violence law in the short term, but relevant regulations can be formulated, or when other laws are revised, content related to cyber violence can be added.
Typical cases demonstrate the determination of the judiciary to punish lawbreakers
In the view of Wei Shizhong, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and vice president of Henan University of Science and Technology, for cyber violence, there are problems of low illegal cost and difficulty in law enforcement and rights protection in specific practice.
He suggested that the responsibility of Internet platforms should be strengthened by improving the legal system, and that cyber violence that seriously endangers society should be included in the scope of public prosecution cases.
In the current Internet context, a large amount of evidence exists on the Internet in defamation cases with serious circumstances or serious harm to social order, and it is very difficult to rely on individual citizens to obtain evidence and protect their rights.
Jia Yu, deputy to the National People's Congress and chief procurator of the Zhejiang Provincial People's Procuratorate, also mentioned that public prosecution can more effectively punish seriously harmful online defamation.
He talked about the case of "Hangzhou woman who was derailed from taking express delivery" and said that the whole evidence collection process lasted for nearly a month during the public prosecution, and finally 18 volumes and 76 CD-ROMs were formed. Protecting the rights of victims can also increase the crime costs of criminal suspects and defendants.”
"The dissemination of online information is inseparable from online platforms. Therefore, we must first start by regulating online platforms, and we should clarify the platform's responsibility for prior review in the law." Representative Luman said.
Committee member Zhou Shihong believes that cyber violence also exposes the insufficiency of current supervision of online platforms.
Although my country's criminal law, civil law, and administrative law all contain content about network supervision, it lacks operability, pertinence and timeliness.
Pi Jianlong, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and director of Beijing Jintai Law Firm, also holds the same view.
"Relevant departments should intensify their efforts to crack down, and public security departments that can file a case should try their best to file a case. The platform should manage customers and the government should manage the platform," he said.
After the "Hangzhou express delivery woman was derailed by rumors", local procuratorates successively prosecuted some online defamation cases.
In the view of representative Jia Yu, this is to declare to the whole society that cyberspace is not an "extra-legal place", and it also demonstrates the determination of the judiciary to strengthen the rule of law on the Internet.