Harassing Users by “Forcing Subscription”--Two Shenzhen Companies Compensating 5 Million for Unfair Competition

Recently, Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court (hereinafter referred to as Shenzhen Intermediate Court) has ruled by first instance that the software package “Data Elf” developed and sold by Shenzhen Micro Source Code Software Development Co., Ltd., Shangquan (Shenzhen) United Development Co., Ltd., and Hou Tuanzeng (hereinafter briefly referred to as the defendant) disrupted Wechat’s business model, and constituted unfair competition.

It is learned that “Data Elf” tampered with the process and data of Wechat, modified its function and interface, and added some special functions such as “forced subscription”, “One-click to comment, like, and forward to moments”, and “send to contacts”.

Shenzhen Intermediate Court held that the defendant's development, publicizing, promotion and sale of the infringing software undermined the security and integrity of the genuine WeChat software and its services, disrupted Wechat’s business model, violated the Internet business norms, honesty and credit principle and recognized business ethics. The court required the defendant to immediately stop downloading, publicizing, promoting, selling, and operating the “Data Elf” software package, and compensate Tencent for economic losses of 5 million Yuan.

For accounts that explicitly use plug-in functions, Wechat security team said that once it’s confirmed, it would restrict the functions or login of the relevant accounts; for those who violate the rules more than once, it would increase restrictions accordingly. Besides, Wechat will continue to crack down on operators who use xposed, substrate and other modules to develop malicious functions, harass users, destroy the platform environment, and make illegal profits.

August 5, 2019

Source: The Democracy and Law Times

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