🇨🇳 China IP Update: Amended Anti-Unfair Competition Law (AUCL) strengthens digital enforcement! 📜⚡
September 25, 2026September 25, 2026

🇨🇳 China IP Update: Amended Anti-Unfair Competition Law (AUCL) strengthens digital enforcement! 📜⚡

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In Intellectual Property Rights

On June 27, 2025, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress approved comprehensive revisions to the PRC Anti-Unfair Competition Law (AUCL), effective October 15, 2025. Featuring 41 articles, this statutory update modernizes China’s competition landscape by directly targeting digital platform abuses, unauthorized data scraping, commercial bribery, and expanded digital brand confusion.

Key Highlights & Strategic Regulatory Shifts

The amended AUCL introduces stricter liability standards, broader protected assets, and substantially higher administrative penalties:

  • Expanded Scope of Digital Confusion Acts: Prohibits the unauthorized use or imitation of influential digital identifiers, including app icons, app names, social media account names, and online aliases. Importantly, assisting others in committing confusion acts now incurs explicit legal liability.
  • Digital Data & Algorithmic Protections: Prohibits the unauthorized acquisition, scraping, or misuse of operational data held by other businesses through circumventing technical protection measures, as well as algorithmic manipulation that disrupts competitors.
  • Platform Governance & Anti-Involution Rules: E-commerce platform operators are prohibited from forcing merchants to sell goods below cost. Platforms must establish transparent complaint and dispute mechanisms, take swift action against infringing listings, and report violations to market supervision authorities.
  • Protections for SMEs & Payment Terms: Large enterprises are forbidden from abusing technical, financial, or channel advantages to impose unreasonable payment terms or delay payments owed to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
  • Heavier Administrative Penalties: Maximum fines for online unfair competition, digital abuses, and commercial bribery have increased up to RMB 5 million. In commercial bribery cases, dual accountability applies to both corporate bribe givers (up to RMB 5 million) and individual bribe recipients (up to RMB 2 million).

Recommended Actions for Brand Owners

To maintain full legal compliance and protect digital market share under the amended AUCL framework, businesses should execute the following audits:

  1. Audit Digital Identifiers & Media Accounts: Review all online branding, mobile application icons, search keywords, and social media handles in China to ensure they do not copy or infringe upon influential competitor identifiers.
  2. Review Supply Chain & Commercial Contracts: Large enterprises operating in China should review procurement agreements and SME vendor contracts to ensure payment terms and breach penalties comply with fair competition standards.
  3. Strengthen E-Commerce & Platform Reporting: Platform operators and online vendors should establish formalized notice-and-takedown workflows and internal dispute resolution channels for immediate enforcement.
  4. Update Anti-Bribery Compliance Guidelines: Enhance internal corporate compliance policies to reflect strict bilateral liability and personal accountability for management and corporate entities.