Proposal to handle many social networks that rate businesses and demand money to remove posts

Posting unverified information to "expose" businesses

According to the petition, VDCA has received a document from the Vietnam Digital Content Creation Alliance Club (DCCA) reflecting that the website currently operates as a social network https://reviewcongty.me allowing users to share a lot of false information, insulting the reputation, honor, and dignity of many businesses and leaders and managers of companies.

Through research and evaluation, VDCA finds that DCCA's reflection is well-founded. The above website and some websites with similar activities https://reviewcongty.com; https://reviewcongty.net have signs of violating the law on management, provision, and use of Internet services and online information as prescribed in Decree 72/2013/ND-CP.

In addition to the above websites, through the feedback of some members, VDCA discovered that on Facebook there are also many groups and fanpages with thousands, tens of thousands of members, allowing anonymous members to post negative content, insulting individuals, businesses, and the reputation of companies. Creating fake news, defaming, slandering, and insulting the honor of many officers and employees, leading to internal conflicts within companies. Information about businesses and individuals has not been verified.

“In particular, according to feedback from VDCA member businesses, the admins of some pages/groups require businesses to pay if they want to remove negative content posted on the page/group,” the VDCA document stated.

VDCA recommends that the Department of Radio, Television and Electronic Information inspect and prevent illegal acts by website owners operating as social networks; take measures to prevent the activities of the above-mentioned Facebook pages and groups.

The Vietnam Digital Communications Association (VDCA) has sent a document to the Department of Radio, Television and Electronic Information proposing to handle 13 social networking sites that evaluate businesses.

Social network Reviewcongty.me has been blocked

Previously, on June 14, 2023, DCCA sent a document to VDCA reporting on the following: Recently, a number of member businesses and partners of DCCA have reported that currently, the social networking site https://reviewcongty.me allows users to share a lot of false information, insulting the reputation, honor, and dignity of many businesses and leaders and managers of companies.

Specifically, the website reviewcongty.me is operating in the form of a social network, registering a domain name and placing a server through a foreign registrar, but operating towards Vietnamese users and using the entire language in Vietnamese. This website allows users to create accounts with the names of businesses and members can write articles, comments, and express personal opinions without any censorship. The accounts are all posted anonymously, without registration, without verification, they can still write reviews and comments about any business or individual. A person can use an unlimited number of anonymous accounts to write and comment. The content is mostly negative, insulting individuals, posting false information about businesses, violating Vietnamese customs and cultural ethics.

Besides reviewcongty.me, there are some websites with similar activities https://reviewcongty.com; https://reviewcongty.net which have signs of violating the law.

Through the review, DCCA found that the above website has some signs of violating the law, specifically violating regulations on management, provision and use of Internet services and online information according to Decree 72/2013/ND-CP and Decree 15/2020/ND-CP regulating administrative sanctions in the fields of post, telecommunications, radio frequencies, information technology and electronic transactions.

In addition, DCCA found that the above website violated regulations on applying for a license to establish a social network. At the same time, this website seriously infringed on the reputation, honor, and brand of thousands of Vietnamese businesses when posting negative information as above.

In response to the above violations, DCCA requested VDCA to speak up to prevent the operation of reviewcongty.me to protect Vietnamese businesses. After DCCA sent a written request to the authorities, on June 19, 2023, the website reviewcongty.me was blocked. Mr. Le Quang Tu Do, Director of the Department of Radio and Television, affirmed that reviewcongty.me is a social network operating illegally in Vietnam.

However, there are still many social networking sites that specialize in reviewing, evaluating, and exposing false information about companies. This has caused, is causing, and will cause damage to the reputation, honor, and property of Vietnamese businesses.

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