Vietnam vows to control digital technology powerhouses
How to force cross-border social networks to observe the laws of the host countries is a challenge not only
International social networks such as Youtube and Facebook can only provide livestream functions for accounts that have registered with Vietnam's Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC).
After six years of applying Decree No. 72-2013/ND-CP on management, supply, and use of internet services and network information, MIC proposed an amendment to the decree on July 10. Under the amendment, enterprises providing cross-border internet services must comply with Vietnam's law; and specialized regulations in its fields such as regulations on social networks, online video games, application stores.
The proposal also stated that Vietnam's agencies have the right to enforce preventive measures if those enterprises violate Vietnamese law or do not cooperate with the agencies to prevent or remove violating contents.
MIC also asked websites/applications having more than 100,000 regular users a month to notify its activities with the ministry and coordinate in handling violations according to the procedure stated by the law. Once approved, Youtube and Facebook, which have 60 million and 65 million users, respectively, will also have to comply with the proposal.
Cross-border services must also prevent and remove violating services or contents within 24 hours upon request from Vietnamese authorities. Telecommunications enterprises are asked to take necessary technical steps to prevent those contents from reaching users in Vietnam.
Users can report violating content on social networks to the ministry and have the right to sue international enterprises if they badly affect the legitimate rights and interests of the users themselves or their organizations.
The ministry also proposed that international social networks take on more responsibilities while operating in Vietnam, such as setting up a department to receive and handle complaints from users, deleting violating content within 24 hours upon a legitimate complaint from affected individuals/organizations, complying with copyright regulations when publishing and broadcasting journalistic works from Vietnamese press agencies.
Vietnamese accounts that have at least 10 thousand followers/ subscribers are asked to send their contact information to the ministry. Only accounts that have notified the ministry can livestream or carry out business services.
Telecommunications and data storage enterprises are responsible for removing content that violates Vietnamese law within 3 days upon receiving requests from the ministry.
Valerie Mai