China: An Analysis of the 2026 Typical Unfair Competition Cases of the People’s Courts
Published 18 September 2026
Sarah Xuan
On 9 September 2026, the Supreme People’s Court released the 2026 Typical Unfair Competition Cases of the People’s Courts, comprising nine disputes. The cases cover imitation and confusion, infringement of technical secrets, online unfair competition, false advertising and commercial disparagement, and also address the application of the general clause of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law. They address business disputes in traditional consumer markets as well as competition issues involving artificial intelligence, new energy and the platform economy.
These cases reflect a relatively clear judicial approach: protecting business identifiers, technological achievements and business goodwill to safeguard the competitive interests of businesses operating in good faith; ensuring that consumers receive truthful commercial information by addressing conduct such as fabricating promotional relationships and distorting product review results; and carefully determining liability for improper traffic diversion and interference with business operations involving new technologies, having regard to the manner of the conduct, its harmful consequences and business ethics.
The relevant cases are introduced below.
I. Protection of Business Identifiers and Regulation of Confusing Conduct (1) Compliant Use of a Company Name May Still Give Rise to Confusion Disputes concerning business identifiers first raise the issue of reconciling company name registration with prior trademark rights and interests. In the dispute concerning “Liufu”, a marketing company was authorised to bring proceedings for infringement of the registered trademarks “Liufu” and “Liufu Jewellery”. The “Jinliufu Shangmei” trademark acquired by a jewellery company was subsequently declared invalid. The jewellery company licensed others to use that sign and registered and used “Jinliufu Shangmei” as its trade name. The court of first instance found that the conduct constituted trademark infringement and unfair competition and ordered, among other relief, payment of RMB 100,000 in damages; although the court of second instance upheld the finding of trademark infringement, it rejected the finding of unfair competition on the ground that the company’s full name had been used in a compliant manner. On retrial, the Supreme People’s Court set aside the second-instance judgment and upheld the first-instance judgment [(2026) Zui Gao Fa Min Zai No. 51].
The Supreme People’s Court’s assessment focused on the reputation of the prior trademark, the degree of similarity between the signs and the likelihood of confusion among the relevant public. The “Liufu” trademark had acquired a substantial market reputation through continuous use and promotion. As a business in the same industry, the jewellery company should have been aware of that reputation, yet it used as its trade name a similar sign incorporating “Liufu” in its entirety, demonstrating a clear intention to ride on another’s goodwill. Even where the company’s full name was used, the relevant public might still mistakenly believe that the goods originated from the registrant of the “Liufu” trademark or that a particular connection existed between the two parties.
The case clarifies the relationship between formal compliance in the use of a company name and the lawfulness of competitive conduct. Neither registration of a company name nor its use without giving prominence to any particular element automatically excludes liability for confusion. Where a business subsequently adopts a similar trade name, whether it is sufficient to cause a mistaken belief as to source or affiliation should be assessed by reference to the name as a whole, the field of business and the context of use. This also means that compliance reviews of company names must consider prior rights and interests in business identifiers; merely checking whether a name can be approved for registration is insufficient to guard adequately against infringement risks.
(2) The Identifying Function and Scope of Protection of Well-Known Film and Television Titles Echoing the company trade name case, the case concerning The Knockout further illustrates the competition law protection available to a film or television title that performs an identifying function. The management company and liquor company involved were established while the television drama was enjoying widespread popularity. They commissioned a brewery to produce alcoholic beverages under the “Kuangbiao” brand, prominently using stylised lettering highly similar to that used in the drama’s opening titles and promoting the products with character names and footage from the drama. The court found that “Kuangbiao”, as the title of the drama, had become consistently associated with that drama, performed an identifying function and constituted a business identifier with a certain degree of influence. The business activities in question led the public to believe mistakenly that a licensing or commercial cooperation relationship existed between the alcoholic beverages and the rights holder of the drama, and therefore constituted unfair competition. The two principal business entities were ordered to pay RMB 5 million in damages, and the commissioned brewery was held jointly and severally liable for RMB 500,000 of that amount. The judgment was upheld on appeal [(2023) Hu 0107 Min Chu No. 14392; (2025) Hu 73 Min Zhong No. 120].
The basis for protection in this case lies in the market influence and source-identifying function acquired by the drama’s title through use. The fact that “kuangbiao” is an ordinary expression does not prevent it from acquiring identifying significance in a particular commercial context; correspondingly, the outcome should not be understood as conferring on the rights holder an unrestricted exclusive right to that expression irrespective of context. The use of similar lettering on the goods at issue, together with promotion incorporating elements of the drama, reinforced the suggestion of a commercial association. Against the background of increasingly widespread licensing of film and television works and commercial exploitation of related merchandise, mistaken beliefs concerning licensing relationships may likewise affect purchasing decisions and erode the rights holder’s commercialisation interests.
The liability of the commissioned manufacturer is also of practical significance. Having regard to the duty of scrutiny incumbent upon a specialist alcoholic beverage manufacturer and its fault, the court held the brewery jointly and severally liable for part of the damages. This indicates that manufacturers accepting orders bearing identifiers associated with well-known cultural works should reasonably verify the basis on which the commissioning party is entitled to use them. Nevertheless, liability in each case must be determined by reference to the commissioned party’s manner of participation, duty of care and fault. The case does not directly support the conclusion that all contract manufacturers must bear the same liability for the commissioning party’s promotional activities.
II. Determining the Commercial Value of Technical Secrets and Assessing Damages While cases concerning business identifiers focus on the accumulation of goodwill and identification of source, cases concerning technical secrets more directly concern the commercial value of research and development results and compensation for their infringement. In the dispute concerning technology for front-end dry fine desulphurisation of blast furnace gas, an engineering company gained access to a technology company’s technical secrets through cooperation and subsequently breached its confidentiality obligations by disclosing, using and permitting others to use the technology in other projects. On appeal, the Supreme People’s Court found infringement and treated the engineering company’s remuneration from the projects in its entirety as profits from infringement, assessing compensatory damages at RMB 44.5849 million. In view of the company’s actual knowledge, serious breach of contract and the serious circumstances of the infringement, the court applied punitive damages at twice that amount; as the resulting calculation exceeded the amount claimed, on 25 December 2025 the court ultimately granted in full the rights holder’s claim for damages against the engineering company. The other two companies were held jointly and severally liable for damages up to the amounts of their respective profits [(2023) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 2880].
An important premise of this approach to damages is that the use of the technical secrets directly determined the engineering company’s acquisition of the commercial opportunities to secure the projects, and that the engineering company acted as the technology provider in those projects. Within that transaction structure, its remuneration reflected the commercial value of the technical secrets and provided a relatively direct basis for determining profits from infringement. The case thus links the protection of technical secrets to the acquisition of project opportunities, preventing infringers from reducing their liability for damages by incorporating returns from technology into remuneration for engineering cooperation.
Application of this rule still requires sufficient proof of a causal relationship between the technical secrets and the remuneration. A technology provider’s remuneration from a project is distinct from the revenue of the engineering project as a whole; complex contracts involving equipment supply, construction or other independent inputs should also be analysed by reference to actual performance and the components of remuneration. The treatment of the entire remuneration as profits from infringement in this case depends on the particular mechanism by which the commercial opportunities arose and cannot be applied mechanically to all engineering projects involving technical secrets. Punitive damages, in turn, rest on evidence of profits and findings of bad faith and serious circumstances, reflecting the connection between compensation for loss and punishment of infringement.
III. The Boundaries of Competition in the Application of Internet Technologies (1) Interference with the Core Functions of Online Products through Transcoding and Reconstruction Technological developments also enable interference with business operations through methods such as webpage reconstruction and automated devices. In the browser “transcoding and reconstruction” case, the defendant used a “reading mode” to remove login, account top-up, tipping and subscription functions from an original literary content website, while embedding its own value-added services, such as an “AI reading assistant”, to encourage users to purchase memberships. It also proactively inserted floating links directing users to pirated resources into the website’s pages, diverting users to other websites where paid chapters could be read free of charge. The Beijing Chaoyang District People’s Court found that the conduct constituted online unfair competition and awarded RMB 1.1 million in damages. The judgment has become legally effective [(2025) Jing 0105 Min Chu No. 48068].
The court distinguished necessary adaptations for reading from interference with business operations exceeding reasonable limits. The reconstruction systematically stripped away the content provider’s core interaction and revenue-generating functions and inserted the defendant’s own services in their place, directly affecting the mechanisms through which legitimate content attracted users and generated revenue. The floating links further facilitated users’ migration to pirated content through preset search terms and webpage traffic diversion. Accordingly, an assessment of the “normal operation” of an online product must consider the relationship between product functions, user relationships and commercial operation; the fact that a webpage remains accessible is insufficient to establish that the service has not suffered material interference.
The case also provides an analytical approach to determining the reasonable boundaries of technology services. Technologies such as transcoding and interface simplification may improve the reading experience, and their assessment under competition law depends on the extent of intervention, the purposes pursued and the actual consequences. The systematic replacement of core functions, exploitation of another party’s investment in content and embedding of the defendant’s own commercial services were important facts supporting the finding of unfairness in this case. Defining liability by reference to these specific facts helps accommodate both the rights and interests of content businesses and the normal development of browsing technologies. (2) The Impact of Order-Grabbing Devices on Platform Operation and Fair Competition The order-grabbing “hardware cheat” case likewise adopted an approach focusing on actual operational effects. An electronics company sold a “tap-and-swipe device” and provided tutorials instructing delivery riders to connect it to a crowdsourced delivery platform’s app to enable rapid refreshing and automatic order grabbing. Although the device did not directly intercept or modify the platform’s data or programs, it circumvented operating rules, interfered with the dispatch algorithm, increased system load and disrupted the order allocation mechanism. The Guangzhou Huangpu District People’s Court found unfair competition and ordered, among other relief, payment of RMB 3 million in damages. The judgment has become legally effective [(2025) Yue 0112 Min Chu No. 19753].
The assessment of competitive harm in this case encompassed multiple participants within the platform. Riders using the cheating device exploited their equipment advantage to seize high-quality orders, squeezing the transaction opportunities available to compliant riders; order grabbing in breach of the rules could also cause order cancellations, delivery delays and unreasonable routing, increasing merchants’ performance risks and harming consumers’ interests. Accordingly, even interference effected through external hardware may fall within the regulation of conduct that impedes or disrupts the normal operation of online services.
At the same time, the fact that a platform establishes its own operating rules does not mean that every tool that breaches those rules necessarily constitutes unfair competition. In this case, the product’s intended use for grabbing orders on a particular platform, the guidance provided in the tutorials and the effects on order allocation and orderly performance together supported the finding of liability. Devices with general functions that assist operation must still be assessed by reference to their specific contexts of use and substantive harm, so as to avoid equating a platform’s business preferences directly with the competitive order protected by law.
(3) Traffic Diversion through AI-Fabricated Reviews and Application of the General Clause Disputes arising from the generation of content in bulk using artificial intelligence further concern the application of the general clause. In the case concerning reviews of purchasing, sales and inventory management software, the defendant used “purchasing, sales and inventory management” as a keyword stem to generate, in bulk through AI, articles introducing and reviewing competitors’ software. It published those articles on its own website and placed links to its own products before and after the articles to obtain search traffic and transaction opportunities. The Wuxi Xinwu District People’s Court found that the conduct reduced the plaintiff’s user traffic and transaction opportunities, generated large quantities of junk information and caused data pollution, constituting unfair competition. It ordered compensation for the corresponding economic losses. The judgment has become legally effective [(2024) Su 0214 Min Chu No. 9489].
The assessment of the AI user in this case rested on the business conduct as a whole: fabricating reviews, publishing them in bulk and attaching links to its own products to divert traffic. A business that organises the generation and publication of content and attracts potential customers by exploiting searches for competitors’ products should bear the corresponding responsibility for that business activity. The fact that articles are generated by a technological tool does not remove the business’s responsibility for their truthfulness and competitive consequences.
In applying the general clause, it is necessary to identify accurately the competitive interests harmed and explain the specific reasons why the conduct violates the principle of good faith and business ethics. A decline in a competitor’s traffic is not, in itself, sufficient to render market competition illegitimate; truthful reviews, reasonable comparisons and ordinary search optimisation may also cause users to switch. The blameworthiness of the conduct in this case lies principally in exploiting interest in another party’s products through fabricated content and improperly obtaining transaction opportunities on a large scale. Grounding the analysis in this pattern of conduct helps preserve the necessary limits of regulation in novel cases.
IV. Truthfulness in Commercial Advertising and Protection of Business Goodwill (1) Fabricating a Product Promotion Relationship Constitutes False Advertising The issue of truthful commercial information arises more directly in livestream commerce. In the case concerning altered livestream clips, a media company extracted footage from a livestream featuring the entertainer Huang and used technical means to alter the voice-over, replacing the face mask originally recommended with a product from another brand and attaching product links to generate sales. The Hangzhou Yuhang District People’s Court found that the conduct led consumers to believe mistakenly that the products had been recommended by Huang and constituted false advertising, and ordered payment of damages. The Hangzhou Intermediate People’s Court upheld the judgment on appeal [(2025) Zhe 0110 Min Chu No. 10694; (2026) Zhe 01 Min Zhong No. 2001].
The case expressly brings product promotion relationships within the scope of scrutiny of the truthfulness of commercial advertising. In making purchasing decisions, consumers may rely on a recommender’s professional image, personal credibility or trust established over time. Fabricating a relationship in which a person recommends, uses or endorses particular goods may affect transactional judgment even where the description of the goods’ performance is not directly altered. The authenticity of livestream clips must therefore be assessed by considering the images, audio, promoted goods and links as a whole; combining genuine footage of a person with altered recommendations may still create false commercial information. For businesses holding exclusive commercial authorisations, such conduct also harms the competitive interests arising from their authorised business operations.
(2) Malicious Editing of Product Review Videos Constitutes Commercial Disparagement Where inaccurate information is used to denigrate competitors, the dispute further falls within the assessment of commercial disparagement. In the “Blade Battery” review video case, a business in the same industry, seeking to promote its own batteries, maliciously spliced together footage of puncturing and fire from another party’s existing review video to create the impression that a “Blade Battery” caught fire immediately upon being punctured, while showing footage of its own products remaining free from fire despite various impacts. The videos prompted a large number of negative comments. The Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone People’s Court found that the conduct distorted the true facts and damaged the competitor’s business reputation and the reputation of its goods, constituting commercial disparagement, and awarded damages exceeding RMB 100,000. The judgment has become legally effective [(2026) Yu 0192 Min Chu No. 19081].
This judgment indicates that the truthfulness of commercial information should be assessed by reference to the full context and overall impression. Even where individual shots are taken from tests that actually occurred, editing, sequencing and juxtaposition may alter the causal relationship they convey and create an inaccurate understanding among viewers. Product reviews are particularly likely to influence consumers’ assessments of safety and reliability. Businesses engaging in comparative advertising should reasonably present test conditions and results and avoid misleading consumers by omitting essential context or splicing together different clips. The space for legitimate technical discussion and criticism should be clearly distinguished from commercial denigration that maliciously distorts the facts.
(3) Concealing Brand Identifiers Does Not Prevent Identification of the Target of Disparagement The “Nuo Te Lan De” comparative advertising case further clarifies the standard for identifying the target of commercial disparagement. In a short video, a department store company concealed the brand identifiers of the product used for comparison but retained its recognisable packaging and asserted that the product’s “contents all fail to meet standards” and that its “calcium, iron and zinc are made of starch”. Platform-generated search prompts, consumer comments and screenshots of returns showed that the public could identify the product as originating from “Nuo Te Lan De”. The defendant also directed viewers to purchase its own products in the comments section. The court held that the negative assertions lacked professional support, such as authoritative testing or industry standards, constituted false information and had already influenced consumers’ purchasing decisions. It ordered, among other relief, cessation of the unfair competition and payment of RMB 300,000 in damages. The Shandong High People’s Court upheld the judgment on appeal [(2025) Lu 05 Min Chu No. 37; (2026) Lu Min Zhong No. 374].
The case demonstrates that the specific identity of the target of commercial disparagement may be established through a combined assessment of packaging features, the context of dissemination and audience reactions. Concealing a trademark neither negates the effect of other identifying information nor severs an understanding of product origin that has already formed. The platform’s automatically generated search prompts and consumer comments corroborated each other in this case, but their probative value in other cases must still be assessed in light of the specific evidence. Categorical assertions concerning a product’s ingredients or whether their quantities meet standards must have a factual basis commensurate with those assertions, so as to avoid presenting unsupported disparaging conclusions as consumer advice.
Considered together, these three advertising cases show that courts assess inaccurate commercial information by reference to how it operates. Fabricating an entertainer’s recommendation affects the public’s understanding of the circumstances of product promotion; maliciously splicing test videos and publishing untrue comparative advertisements directly damage assessments of a competitor’s products and its business goodwill. Whether the advertising content is inaccurate, how the public understands it, whether the injured business can be identified and how the information affects transactional choices are interrelated factual questions in the examination process. This analysis also helps avoid conclusions based solely on the form of advertising or isolated wording.
Conclusion The nine cases released on this occasion apply the Anti-Unfair Competition Law’s requirements of good faith in business to specific commercial contexts. Compliant use of a company’s full name, the outward form of technical processing, the involvement of external hardware, automatically generated articles and concealed brand identifiers must all be examined in light of their actual competitive effects. The identifying value of business identifiers, project opportunities derived from technical secrets, the normal operation of platform services and truthful and reliable transactional information constitute the specific focal points for protecting the competitive order in the respective cases.
Following this adjudicative approach, judicial enforcement of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law can effectively restrain free-riding on goodwill, misappropriation of technological achievements and manipulation of commercial information, while preserving reasonable scope for legitimate comparisons, technological improvements and business innovation, enabling businesses to compete through product quality, service capabilities and independent innovation.
These cases reflect a relatively clear judicial approach: protecting business identifiers, technological achievements and business goodwill to safeguard the competitive interests of businesses operating in good faith; ensuring that consumers receive truthful commercial information by addressing conduct such as fabricating promotional relationships and distorting product review results; and carefully determining liability for improper traffic diversion and interference with business operations involving new technologies, having regard to the manner of the conduct, its harmful consequences and business ethics.
The relevant cases are introduced below.
I. Protection of Business Identifiers and Regulation of Confusing Conduct (1) Compliant Use of a Company Name May Still Give Rise to Confusion Disputes concerning business identifiers first raise the issue of reconciling company name registration with prior trademark rights and interests. In the dispute concerning “Liufu”, a marketing company was authorised to bring proceedings for infringement of the registered trademarks “Liufu” and “Liufu Jewellery”. The “Jinliufu Shangmei” trademark acquired by a jewellery company was subsequently declared invalid. The jewellery company licensed others to use that sign and registered and used “Jinliufu Shangmei” as its trade name. The court of first instance found that the conduct constituted trademark infringement and unfair competition and ordered, among other relief, payment of RMB 100,000 in damages; although the court of second instance upheld the finding of trademark infringement, it rejected the finding of unfair competition on the ground that the company’s full name had been used in a compliant manner. On retrial, the Supreme People’s Court set aside the second-instance judgment and upheld the first-instance judgment [(2026) Zui Gao Fa Min Zai No. 51].
The Supreme People’s Court’s assessment focused on the reputation of the prior trademark, the degree of similarity between the signs and the likelihood of confusion among the relevant public. The “Liufu” trademark had acquired a substantial market reputation through continuous use and promotion. As a business in the same industry, the jewellery company should have been aware of that reputation, yet it used as its trade name a similar sign incorporating “Liufu” in its entirety, demonstrating a clear intention to ride on another’s goodwill. Even where the company’s full name was used, the relevant public might still mistakenly believe that the goods originated from the registrant of the “Liufu” trademark or that a particular connection existed between the two parties.
The case clarifies the relationship between formal compliance in the use of a company name and the lawfulness of competitive conduct. Neither registration of a company name nor its use without giving prominence to any particular element automatically excludes liability for confusion. Where a business subsequently adopts a similar trade name, whether it is sufficient to cause a mistaken belief as to source or affiliation should be assessed by reference to the name as a whole, the field of business and the context of use. This also means that compliance reviews of company names must consider prior rights and interests in business identifiers; merely checking whether a name can be approved for registration is insufficient to guard adequately against infringement risks.
(2) The Identifying Function and Scope of Protection of Well-Known Film and Television Titles Echoing the company trade name case, the case concerning The Knockout further illustrates the competition law protection available to a film or television title that performs an identifying function. The management company and liquor company involved were established while the television drama was enjoying widespread popularity. They commissioned a brewery to produce alcoholic beverages under the “Kuangbiao” brand, prominently using stylised lettering highly similar to that used in the drama’s opening titles and promoting the products with character names and footage from the drama. The court found that “Kuangbiao”, as the title of the drama, had become consistently associated with that drama, performed an identifying function and constituted a business identifier with a certain degree of influence. The business activities in question led the public to believe mistakenly that a licensing or commercial cooperation relationship existed between the alcoholic beverages and the rights holder of the drama, and therefore constituted unfair competition. The two principal business entities were ordered to pay RMB 5 million in damages, and the commissioned brewery was held jointly and severally liable for RMB 500,000 of that amount. The judgment was upheld on appeal [(2023) Hu 0107 Min Chu No. 14392; (2025) Hu 73 Min Zhong No. 120].
The basis for protection in this case lies in the market influence and source-identifying function acquired by the drama’s title through use. The fact that “kuangbiao” is an ordinary expression does not prevent it from acquiring identifying significance in a particular commercial context; correspondingly, the outcome should not be understood as conferring on the rights holder an unrestricted exclusive right to that expression irrespective of context. The use of similar lettering on the goods at issue, together with promotion incorporating elements of the drama, reinforced the suggestion of a commercial association. Against the background of increasingly widespread licensing of film and television works and commercial exploitation of related merchandise, mistaken beliefs concerning licensing relationships may likewise affect purchasing decisions and erode the rights holder’s commercialisation interests.
The liability of the commissioned manufacturer is also of practical significance. Having regard to the duty of scrutiny incumbent upon a specialist alcoholic beverage manufacturer and its fault, the court held the brewery jointly and severally liable for part of the damages. This indicates that manufacturers accepting orders bearing identifiers associated with well-known cultural works should reasonably verify the basis on which the commissioning party is entitled to use them. Nevertheless, liability in each case must be determined by reference to the commissioned party’s manner of participation, duty of care and fault. The case does not directly support the conclusion that all contract manufacturers must bear the same liability for the commissioning party’s promotional activities.
II. Determining the Commercial Value of Technical Secrets and Assessing Damages While cases concerning business identifiers focus on the accumulation of goodwill and identification of source, cases concerning technical secrets more directly concern the commercial value of research and development results and compensation for their infringement. In the dispute concerning technology for front-end dry fine desulphurisation of blast furnace gas, an engineering company gained access to a technology company’s technical secrets through cooperation and subsequently breached its confidentiality obligations by disclosing, using and permitting others to use the technology in other projects. On appeal, the Supreme People’s Court found infringement and treated the engineering company’s remuneration from the projects in its entirety as profits from infringement, assessing compensatory damages at RMB 44.5849 million. In view of the company’s actual knowledge, serious breach of contract and the serious circumstances of the infringement, the court applied punitive damages at twice that amount; as the resulting calculation exceeded the amount claimed, on 25 December 2025 the court ultimately granted in full the rights holder’s claim for damages against the engineering company. The other two companies were held jointly and severally liable for damages up to the amounts of their respective profits [(2023) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 2880].
An important premise of this approach to damages is that the use of the technical secrets directly determined the engineering company’s acquisition of the commercial opportunities to secure the projects, and that the engineering company acted as the technology provider in those projects. Within that transaction structure, its remuneration reflected the commercial value of the technical secrets and provided a relatively direct basis for determining profits from infringement. The case thus links the protection of technical secrets to the acquisition of project opportunities, preventing infringers from reducing their liability for damages by incorporating returns from technology into remuneration for engineering cooperation.
Application of this rule still requires sufficient proof of a causal relationship between the technical secrets and the remuneration. A technology provider’s remuneration from a project is distinct from the revenue of the engineering project as a whole; complex contracts involving equipment supply, construction or other independent inputs should also be analysed by reference to actual performance and the components of remuneration. The treatment of the entire remuneration as profits from infringement in this case depends on the particular mechanism by which the commercial opportunities arose and cannot be applied mechanically to all engineering projects involving technical secrets. Punitive damages, in turn, rest on evidence of profits and findings of bad faith and serious circumstances, reflecting the connection between compensation for loss and punishment of infringement.
III. The Boundaries of Competition in the Application of Internet Technologies (1) Interference with the Core Functions of Online Products through Transcoding and Reconstruction Technological developments also enable interference with business operations through methods such as webpage reconstruction and automated devices. In the browser “transcoding and reconstruction” case, the defendant used a “reading mode” to remove login, account top-up, tipping and subscription functions from an original literary content website, while embedding its own value-added services, such as an “AI reading assistant”, to encourage users to purchase memberships. It also proactively inserted floating links directing users to pirated resources into the website’s pages, diverting users to other websites where paid chapters could be read free of charge. The Beijing Chaoyang District People’s Court found that the conduct constituted online unfair competition and awarded RMB 1.1 million in damages. The judgment has become legally effective [(2025) Jing 0105 Min Chu No. 48068].
The court distinguished necessary adaptations for reading from interference with business operations exceeding reasonable limits. The reconstruction systematically stripped away the content provider’s core interaction and revenue-generating functions and inserted the defendant’s own services in their place, directly affecting the mechanisms through which legitimate content attracted users and generated revenue. The floating links further facilitated users’ migration to pirated content through preset search terms and webpage traffic diversion. Accordingly, an assessment of the “normal operation” of an online product must consider the relationship between product functions, user relationships and commercial operation; the fact that a webpage remains accessible is insufficient to establish that the service has not suffered material interference.
The case also provides an analytical approach to determining the reasonable boundaries of technology services. Technologies such as transcoding and interface simplification may improve the reading experience, and their assessment under competition law depends on the extent of intervention, the purposes pursued and the actual consequences. The systematic replacement of core functions, exploitation of another party’s investment in content and embedding of the defendant’s own commercial services were important facts supporting the finding of unfairness in this case. Defining liability by reference to these specific facts helps accommodate both the rights and interests of content businesses and the normal development of browsing technologies. (2) The Impact of Order-Grabbing Devices on Platform Operation and Fair Competition The order-grabbing “hardware cheat” case likewise adopted an approach focusing on actual operational effects. An electronics company sold a “tap-and-swipe device” and provided tutorials instructing delivery riders to connect it to a crowdsourced delivery platform’s app to enable rapid refreshing and automatic order grabbing. Although the device did not directly intercept or modify the platform’s data or programs, it circumvented operating rules, interfered with the dispatch algorithm, increased system load and disrupted the order allocation mechanism. The Guangzhou Huangpu District People’s Court found unfair competition and ordered, among other relief, payment of RMB 3 million in damages. The judgment has become legally effective [(2025) Yue 0112 Min Chu No. 19753].
The assessment of competitive harm in this case encompassed multiple participants within the platform. Riders using the cheating device exploited their equipment advantage to seize high-quality orders, squeezing the transaction opportunities available to compliant riders; order grabbing in breach of the rules could also cause order cancellations, delivery delays and unreasonable routing, increasing merchants’ performance risks and harming consumers’ interests. Accordingly, even interference effected through external hardware may fall within the regulation of conduct that impedes or disrupts the normal operation of online services.
At the same time, the fact that a platform establishes its own operating rules does not mean that every tool that breaches those rules necessarily constitutes unfair competition. In this case, the product’s intended use for grabbing orders on a particular platform, the guidance provided in the tutorials and the effects on order allocation and orderly performance together supported the finding of liability. Devices with general functions that assist operation must still be assessed by reference to their specific contexts of use and substantive harm, so as to avoid equating a platform’s business preferences directly with the competitive order protected by law.
(3) Traffic Diversion through AI-Fabricated Reviews and Application of the General Clause Disputes arising from the generation of content in bulk using artificial intelligence further concern the application of the general clause. In the case concerning reviews of purchasing, sales and inventory management software, the defendant used “purchasing, sales and inventory management” as a keyword stem to generate, in bulk through AI, articles introducing and reviewing competitors’ software. It published those articles on its own website and placed links to its own products before and after the articles to obtain search traffic and transaction opportunities. The Wuxi Xinwu District People’s Court found that the conduct reduced the plaintiff’s user traffic and transaction opportunities, generated large quantities of junk information and caused data pollution, constituting unfair competition. It ordered compensation for the corresponding economic losses. The judgment has become legally effective [(2024) Su 0214 Min Chu No. 9489].
The assessment of the AI user in this case rested on the business conduct as a whole: fabricating reviews, publishing them in bulk and attaching links to its own products to divert traffic. A business that organises the generation and publication of content and attracts potential customers by exploiting searches for competitors’ products should bear the corresponding responsibility for that business activity. The fact that articles are generated by a technological tool does not remove the business’s responsibility for their truthfulness and competitive consequences.
In applying the general clause, it is necessary to identify accurately the competitive interests harmed and explain the specific reasons why the conduct violates the principle of good faith and business ethics. A decline in a competitor’s traffic is not, in itself, sufficient to render market competition illegitimate; truthful reviews, reasonable comparisons and ordinary search optimisation may also cause users to switch. The blameworthiness of the conduct in this case lies principally in exploiting interest in another party’s products through fabricated content and improperly obtaining transaction opportunities on a large scale. Grounding the analysis in this pattern of conduct helps preserve the necessary limits of regulation in novel cases.
IV. Truthfulness in Commercial Advertising and Protection of Business Goodwill (1) Fabricating a Product Promotion Relationship Constitutes False Advertising The issue of truthful commercial information arises more directly in livestream commerce. In the case concerning altered livestream clips, a media company extracted footage from a livestream featuring the entertainer Huang and used technical means to alter the voice-over, replacing the face mask originally recommended with a product from another brand and attaching product links to generate sales. The Hangzhou Yuhang District People’s Court found that the conduct led consumers to believe mistakenly that the products had been recommended by Huang and constituted false advertising, and ordered payment of damages. The Hangzhou Intermediate People’s Court upheld the judgment on appeal [(2025) Zhe 0110 Min Chu No. 10694; (2026) Zhe 01 Min Zhong No. 2001].
The case expressly brings product promotion relationships within the scope of scrutiny of the truthfulness of commercial advertising. In making purchasing decisions, consumers may rely on a recommender’s professional image, personal credibility or trust established over time. Fabricating a relationship in which a person recommends, uses or endorses particular goods may affect transactional judgment even where the description of the goods’ performance is not directly altered. The authenticity of livestream clips must therefore be assessed by considering the images, audio, promoted goods and links as a whole; combining genuine footage of a person with altered recommendations may still create false commercial information. For businesses holding exclusive commercial authorisations, such conduct also harms the competitive interests arising from their authorised business operations.
(2) Malicious Editing of Product Review Videos Constitutes Commercial Disparagement Where inaccurate information is used to denigrate competitors, the dispute further falls within the assessment of commercial disparagement. In the “Blade Battery” review video case, a business in the same industry, seeking to promote its own batteries, maliciously spliced together footage of puncturing and fire from another party’s existing review video to create the impression that a “Blade Battery” caught fire immediately upon being punctured, while showing footage of its own products remaining free from fire despite various impacts. The videos prompted a large number of negative comments. The Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone People’s Court found that the conduct distorted the true facts and damaged the competitor’s business reputation and the reputation of its goods, constituting commercial disparagement, and awarded damages exceeding RMB 100,000. The judgment has become legally effective [(2026) Yu 0192 Min Chu No. 19081].
This judgment indicates that the truthfulness of commercial information should be assessed by reference to the full context and overall impression. Even where individual shots are taken from tests that actually occurred, editing, sequencing and juxtaposition may alter the causal relationship they convey and create an inaccurate understanding among viewers. Product reviews are particularly likely to influence consumers’ assessments of safety and reliability. Businesses engaging in comparative advertising should reasonably present test conditions and results and avoid misleading consumers by omitting essential context or splicing together different clips. The space for legitimate technical discussion and criticism should be clearly distinguished from commercial denigration that maliciously distorts the facts.
(3) Concealing Brand Identifiers Does Not Prevent Identification of the Target of Disparagement The “Nuo Te Lan De” comparative advertising case further clarifies the standard for identifying the target of commercial disparagement. In a short video, a department store company concealed the brand identifiers of the product used for comparison but retained its recognisable packaging and asserted that the product’s “contents all fail to meet standards” and that its “calcium, iron and zinc are made of starch”. Platform-generated search prompts, consumer comments and screenshots of returns showed that the public could identify the product as originating from “Nuo Te Lan De”. The defendant also directed viewers to purchase its own products in the comments section. The court held that the negative assertions lacked professional support, such as authoritative testing or industry standards, constituted false information and had already influenced consumers’ purchasing decisions. It ordered, among other relief, cessation of the unfair competition and payment of RMB 300,000 in damages. The Shandong High People’s Court upheld the judgment on appeal [(2025) Lu 05 Min Chu No. 37; (2026) Lu Min Zhong No. 374].
The case demonstrates that the specific identity of the target of commercial disparagement may be established through a combined assessment of packaging features, the context of dissemination and audience reactions. Concealing a trademark neither negates the effect of other identifying information nor severs an understanding of product origin that has already formed. The platform’s automatically generated search prompts and consumer comments corroborated each other in this case, but their probative value in other cases must still be assessed in light of the specific evidence. Categorical assertions concerning a product’s ingredients or whether their quantities meet standards must have a factual basis commensurate with those assertions, so as to avoid presenting unsupported disparaging conclusions as consumer advice.
Considered together, these three advertising cases show that courts assess inaccurate commercial information by reference to how it operates. Fabricating an entertainer’s recommendation affects the public’s understanding of the circumstances of product promotion; maliciously splicing test videos and publishing untrue comparative advertisements directly damage assessments of a competitor’s products and its business goodwill. Whether the advertising content is inaccurate, how the public understands it, whether the injured business can be identified and how the information affects transactional choices are interrelated factual questions in the examination process. This analysis also helps avoid conclusions based solely on the form of advertising or isolated wording.
Conclusion The nine cases released on this occasion apply the Anti-Unfair Competition Law’s requirements of good faith in business to specific commercial contexts. Compliant use of a company’s full name, the outward form of technical processing, the involvement of external hardware, automatically generated articles and concealed brand identifiers must all be examined in light of their actual competitive effects. The identifying value of business identifiers, project opportunities derived from technical secrets, the normal operation of platform services and truthful and reliable transactional information constitute the specific focal points for protecting the competitive order in the respective cases.
Following this adjudicative approach, judicial enforcement of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law can effectively restrain free-riding on goodwill, misappropriation of technological achievements and manipulation of commercial information, while preserving reasonable scope for legitimate comparisons, technological improvements and business innovation, enabling businesses to compete through product quality, service capabilities and independent innovation.