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Coco Feng

Police in mainland China have dismantled a coordinated, months-long smear campaign targeting major e-commerce platforms Alibaba Group Holding and JD.com, as Beijing continues to facilitate fair competition and improve the environment for the private sector.
Both companies publicly praised the police in Chengdu, capital of China’s southwestern Sichuan province, for “combating online rumours” and “maintaining a clean and healthy online environment”, according to social media posts last week by JD.com and Taobao Shangou, the instant commerce unit of Alibaba.
The Taobao Shangou post specifically said that the false information included fabricated images of uniforms of its food delivery couriers with altered text on the clothes to imply that the platform offered illegal services.
JD.com, which did not specify what the smears were about, said they targeted not only its food delivery operations but also its finance unit and its founder, Richard Liu Qiangdong.
JD.com and Alibaba pointed to the alleged involvement of Chengdu Xiaoben Culture Media, a media agency hired by an unnamed company to conduct the online attacks. Neither company identified who was behind Chengdu Xiaoben’s campaign. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
The public security authority in Sichuan announced the case earlier this month, stating it had imposed administrative penalties on five individuals from the agency. It added that it handed the relevant evidence to market regulation authorities for further investigation.
The smear campaign began last summer when China’s three major food delivery platforms – operated by Alibaba, JD.com and Meituan – were locked in a price war and giving away products such as milk tea to woo consumers. The fierce competition even prompted the State Administration for Market Regulation to urge them to engage in “rational” competition.
The case comes at a critical time ahead of the “618” shopping festival finale, one of China’s biggest online retail events, on June 18. Last week, market regulator authorities in Beijing summoned representatives from Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall, JD.com, Pinduoduo, ByteDance’s Douyin and RedNote, to curb so-called involution-style competition.
The regulator flagged concerns over inadequate disclosure of promotional rules and the failure to properly display merchant information.
The meeting followed an earlier one last month where the municipal regulator called in more than a dozen internet platforms and warned them against engaging in involution-style competition during the shopping festival.
Amid a slowing economy, the government has been making efforts over the past few years to protect the country’s private sector. In May last year, the Cyberspace Administration of China, the top internet watchdog, announced a campaign dedicated to cracking down on internet trolls targeting businesses.
Examples of malicious behaviour included false information about a company’s product quality and performance, demanding “public relations fees” from an enterprise to delete negative content, or rehashing old news about the firm.


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Police in Sichuan say they dismantled the months-long operation ahead of the finale of the online retail ‘618’ festival


Police in Sichuan say they dismantled the months-long operation ahead of the finale of the online retail ‘618’ festival.


Chinese police smash smear campaign targeting Alibaba, JD.com ahead of shopping festival

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Police in Sichuan say they dismantled the months-long operation ahead of the finale of the online retail ‘618’ festival

Police in Sichuan say they dismantled the months-long operation ahead of the finale of the online retail ‘618’ festival