EXCLUSIVE Vietnam preparing rules to limit news posts on social media accounts – sources

SINGAPORE/HANOI, Sept 28 (Reuters) – Vietnam is getting ready new guidelines to restrict which social media accounts can publish news-related content material, three individuals conversant in the matter mentioned, as authorities tighten their management over information and data sources within the nation.

The principles, anticipated to be introduced by the year-end and with particulars but to be hammered out, would set up a authorized foundation for controlling information dissemination on platforms like Fb and YouTube whereas inserting a big moderation burden on platform suppliers, two of the sources added.

The sources requested to not be recognized, as discussions in regards to the new guidelines stay confidential.

Vietnam’s Ministry of Info and Communications and Ministry of Overseas Affairs didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.

“The federal government needs to repair what it sees because the ‘news-lisation’ of social media,” mentioned one supply conversant in the talks. “Information-lisation”, or báo hoá, is a time period utilized by the authorities to explain the deceptive of customers into pondering that social media accounts are authorised information shops.

Authorities officers have been holding confidential conferences with common social media and web companies to transient them on which kinds of accounts will probably be allowed to publish information content material below the brand new guidelines, in accordance with the sources.

Authorities would have the ability to order social media firms to ban accounts that break these guidelines, they mentioned.

Vietnam’s ruling Communist Occasion already maintains tight media censorship and tolerates little dissent, with one of many world’s most stringent web regimes and nationwide pointers on social media behaviour.

Two sources with direct information instructed Reuters that extra guidelines on web and social media platforms could be launched across the fourth quarter of 2022 to early 2023.

As tech-savvy younger Vietnamese more and more flip to social media for data, these platforms have turn into a goal for presidency efforts to limit the circulation of stories from unauthorised sources.

Vietnam is a top-10 market globally for Fb with 60 million to 70 million customers, in accordance with 2021 knowledge, and sources conversant in the matter mentioned it generates round $1 billion in annual income for the corporate – surpassing France.

YouTube has 60 million customers in Vietnam and TikTok has 20 million, in accordance with 2021 authorities estimates, though Twitter stays a comparatively small participant.

Meta Platforms Inc (META.O), proprietor of Fb, and Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) declined to remark. Alphabet Inc’s Google and YouTube didn’t reply to requests for remark. TikTok mentioned in a press release that it addresses content material violations primarily based on relevant legal guidelines and with adherence to its pointers, however didn’t touch upon pending Vietnam laws.

The Vietnamese authorities had adopted in July a set of non-binding pointers on what qualifies as information shops, together with standards to tell apart “actual” and “pretend” information shops, warning that some social networking websites embody accounts that mislead customers into pondering they’re newspapers.

These pointers are anticipated to be integrated into the brand new guidelines, which will probably be binding.

The authorities are additionally anticipated to implement new guidelines that may require social media platforms to instantly take down content material deemed to hurt nationwide safety, and to take away unlawful content material inside 24 hours, sources conversant in the matter mentioned.

Sources instructed Reuters in April that the brand new guidelines, which have been initially deliberate for July, mirrored the federal government’s dissatisfaction with social media platforms’ take-down charges. learn extra

This will probably be performed by way of amendments to the nation’s fundamental web legislation.

Vietnam in August additionally issued a brand new regulation, as a consequence of come into impact from October, that can require know-how companies to retailer customers’ knowledge domestically and to arrange native workplaces.

Reporting by Fanny Potkin in Singapore and Phuong Nguyen in Hanoi; Enhancing by Edmund Klamann

Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Belief Ideas.