Notice of the National Press and Publication Administration on Further Strict Management and Effective Prevention of Minors' Addiction to Online Games

The Notice of the National Press and Publication Administration on Further Strict Management to Effectively Prevent Minors from Becoming Addicted to Online Games is a document issued by the National Press and Publication Administration on further strict management measures to address the problem of minors' excessive use of, or even addiction to, online games. The notice was issued on 30 August 2021, and sets out requirements for major online games in mainland China regarding anti-addiction mechanisms for minors.

Background and purpose
On 25 October 2019, National Press and Publication Administration issued the "Notice of the State Press and Publication Administration on Preventing Minors from Becoming Addicted to Online Games" (Guo Xin Departure [2019] No. 34), which stipulates that online gaming enterprises are not allowed to provide gaming services to minors in any form from 22:00 p.m. each day to 8:00 a.m. the following day. The Circular also stipulates that the duration of game services provided to minors by online gaming enterprises shall not exceed a cumulative total of three hours per day on statutory holidays, and a cumulative total of 1.5 hours per day at other times.

In July 2021, the General Office of the Chinese Communist Party and the General Office of the State Council issued the Opinions on Further Reducing the Burden of Homework for Students in Compulsory Education and the Burden of Out-of-School Training, which mentions the need to prevent minors from becoming addicted to the internet. On 3 August, the Economic Reference Daily published a news report entitled "'Mental opium' grows into hundreds of billions of dollars of industry", which referred to online games as a new type of "drug" and "mental opium". "As a result, the game sector of A-share and Hong Kong stock market fell, and the total market value evaporated close to 300 billion yuan. However, this report was deleted shortly after publication, and later that day, the Economic Reference News re-published a revised version, with the title of the article changed to "Online games have grown into a hundreds of billions of dollars of industry", and the previously published terms such as "mental opium" and "electronic drugs" were deleted.

The head of National Press and Publicah the Notice of the State Press and Publication Administration on Preventing Minors from Becoming Addicted to Online Games (Guoxin Departure [2019] No. 34) was issued in 2019, many parents believe that the restrictions on minors are still too loose, so this time a stricter specification was made in response to public opinion. The State Press and Publication Administration believes that "in recent years, China network game industry in the rapid development of the same time, there are some outstanding problems, especially minors addicted to online games problem caused widespread social concern, the majority of parents reflect strong. [...]issued a notice on the occasion of the start of the new semester to put forward specific and clear requirements for the work of online game addiction prevention, and strive to promote the work of anti-addiction to achieve better social results for the healthy growth of minors to escort."

Substance
The notice requires strict limitation of the time to provide online game services to minors, "all online game enterprises can only provide 1 hour of service to minors on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays [b] and legal holidays from 20:00 to 21:00 daily, and other times are not allowed to provide any form of service". The notice also mentioned that real-name registration of game accounts must be strictly implemented, that services cannot be provided to unregistered accounts, that management departments at all levels must implement supervision and review, and that online gaming companies that fail to strictly implement this must be dealt with seriously in accordance with the law. The notice asserts that it is necessary to actively guide families, schools and other aspects of society to co-manage and co-rule, fulfil the responsibility of guardianship of minors in accordance with the law, and create a good environment for the healthy growth of minors.

Impact and controversy
After the notice was issued, more than ten online game companies responded to the notice in the first instance and immediately implemented the programmed on 31 August 2021.

Tencent responded that it has continued to carry out spontaneous exploration and application of various new technologies and functions for the protection of minors from 2017 to the present. Next, based on the latest requirements of the competent authorities, Tencent will strictly comply and actively implement them. Tencent also indicated that in August 2021, it has piloted from Honor Of Kings and Game for Peace to gradually reduce the length of game time for minors on non-statutory holidays to one hour per day, and on statutory holidays to two hours per day. Tencent also pointed out that players under the age of 12 are prohibited from spending money in Tencent's games, and that it will also crack down on minors posing as adult accounts to buy and sell adult accounts for third-party platforms.

JD removed 87 games from its online markets, including Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto, Animal Crossing and FIFA. However, considering that minors will not be able to log in every day to get daily login rewards after the implementation of the programme, some game companies have also provided urgent compensation measures for minors. For example, MiHoYo has given out the prepaid daily login rewards of its open-world action role-playing game Genshin Impact and 3D role-playing action game Honkai Impact 3rd to underage players in advance.

The stock markets of some companies related to online games were also lower as a result of the notice. As of 30 August 2021 before the U.S. stock market, NetEase U.S. stock price fell more than 7%, Bilibili U.S. stock price fell 1.8%. Part of the network tour class play stocks and in the early trading on 31 August to open low, Hong Kong stock market, Tencent fell more than 3%; A-share market, Perfect World, YOOZOO Interactive fell more than 4%, Electric Soul Network, Sheng Tian Network, Jibit, ZQGame, 37Games, etc. have been dipped.

On 6 September 2021, the National Office for Combating Pornography and Illegality deployed and arranged for local departments to carry out the "Protecting Seedlings 2021" special action, in which preventing minors from becoming addicted to the Internet is one of the tasks. Late at night on 8 September, the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, the State Press and Publication Administration, the Central Internet Information Office, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and other departments interviewed Tencent, NetEase and other online game companies and game account rental and sale platforms, game broadcasting platforms, stressing that no form of online game account rental and sale of trading services should be provided to minors.

In addition, after the implementation of the notice, during the hours when minors were allowed to play, there were cases in which a large number of minors flooded in at the same time and caused the server of the game of Honor of Kings to crash, resulting in all the players not being able to play the game, which triggered public grievances. There have also been cases of minors being scammed out of their money in order to circumvent the anti-addiction mechanism after the introduction of the new regulations. Although the ban on online games is said to be the "strictest in history   ", it does not have jurisdiction over overseas online games, and some underage players may choose to play overseas online games by "climbing over the wall" in order to avoid regulation, which may result in the loss of the ability of Chinese mainland players to play overseas online games. This may result in a small increase in the number of mainland Chinese players of offshore online games.

Some Internet users in mainland China believe that the notice is too strict or even overkill in restricting online gaming services for minors and question whether the restriction can achieve the desired effect, while some are concerned about whether online gaming services for adults can be protected. Some internet users have also expressed on Weibo that China's e-sports teams could be devastated, and it is possible that e-sports tournaments will no longer have Chinese players winning awards in the future. Bloomberg News believes that the suspension of game license numbers after August 2021 is related to this.

Some smaller game developers have seen their revenues severely impacted, with the music game Synchronized Sound Meow Saik, seeing first day revenues of only 600 RMB after the addition of the underage restriction.