The Chinese government is attempting to crack down on pornographic content online and Internet giant Sina.com cannot even avoid punishment. Thanks to explicit content found on one of its sites, the company stands to lose two important licences.
The National Office Against Pornographic and Illegal Publications said that it discovered 20 articles and four videos that featured lewd content thanks to public tips, reports state news agency Xinhua. Then, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television said that it could revoke Sena’s licenses to post video and audio. Sina also faces “a large number of fines.”
According to The Associated Press, Sina later issued an apology, stating that it is “sorry and ashamed” for allowing the content to be published. It added that it quickly tried to fix the situation.
An official told Xinhua that it is not clear if Sena will actually face the punishment right away and how large the fine would be as the company could get an opportunity to appeal the decision.
Sina previously faced punishment for lewd content last year. The company also owns Sina Weibo, China’s massively popular Twitter-esque social network. Earlier this month, the company tried to clean Weibo of inappropriate content, even shutting down the reading section in order to do so.
Xinhua said that the government has just begun a “Cleaning the Web 2014” campaign, which has resulted in 110 web sites being shut down.