Stricter regulation puts internet sector on right track

China has strengthened its regulation of the internet sector by introducing rules to root out monopolistic practices and tighten data security.

But that does not mean the development of the internet industry in China has entered a cold winter. Effective regulation and supervision are necessary to keep its development on the right track.

Although China has one of the world’s largest internet markets, its internet industry has many obvious shortcomings. For instance, the IT companies lag behind in core technology, and most of them have not entered foreign markets.

These mammoth IT corporations’ contributions to the real economy are out of proportion to their size and influence on the economy.

So the watchdog departments’ probe into some big-name companies is to cleanse the market environment, set out standards for the industry, protect legal rights and interests of network users, and safeguard national security.

China wants its internet industry to grow healthily so that it can give more support to the real economy, while guaranteeing data security for both individual users and the country.

It is thus predictable that the development of China’s internet industry will witness three changes. First, although the government will continue to provide the IT enterprises with the opportunity for trial and error, it will be more prudent in doing that, and urge the IT companies to fulfill more of their responsibility to maintain data security and protect network users’ rights and interests.

Second, with the rollout of 5G nationwide, the government wants the internet industry to do more to boost the growth of the real economy, and shoulder more responsibility for people’s well-being, since many of them are deeply involved in providing public services.

Third, the huge domestic market will continue to boost the development of the IT industry at home, thus relevant enterprises should prepare to take part in competition in the international market.

In this process, these companies must increase their inputs into the research and development of core technologies.

The industrial internet is different from the consumer internet. In the future the industrial internet will help boost the real economy, and promote the digital transformation and high-quality development of industry.