For years, China’s business environment has been a bit like the Wild West—only with more knockoffs, keyword hijacking, and fake online reviews than a shady eBay seller convention. If you built a brand, it was open season for imitators to leech off your reputation. Search for your product online, and odds are you’d find some “similar” listing piggybacking off your trademark as a keyword. And if you complained? Well, good luck with that.
That’s why the newly revised Anti-Unfair Competition Law—passed June 27, 2025, and taking effect October 15—marks a pretty significant pivot.
This isn’t just another set of rule tweaks. It’s a sign that Beijing has recognized several big realities:
- The old law was written for an analog economy, not the algorithmic one we live in now.
Back in the ’90s, unfair competition was about copying product packaging or running misleading ads. Fast forward to today, and the battlefield is dominated by platform algorithms, data scraping, and SEO manipulation. The old law simply wasn’t built to handle things like “keyword squatting” or “comment farming,” and bad actors took full advantage. - China’s digital economy can’t thrive if no one trusts the playing field.
The government wants to be a global leader in AI, e-commerce, and fintech. But you can’t lure serious investment—domestic or foreign—if innovators fear their ideas will be swiped and their traffic diverted by clever cheats. Tightening the rules helps build credibility with both entrepreneurs and trading partners. - Small and medium-sized enterprises were getting crushed.
Large platforms and corporations have been using their clout to force predatory payment terms, undercut prices below cost, and lock smaller players into unfair conditions. The revised law directly tackles this “payment term bullying” and abusive platform rule-making. That’s not just good policy—it’s survival gear for keeping the SME sector alive. - Data is the new gold, and China is fencing it in.
In the old days, you stole a competitor’s design. Today, you siphon their user data. The law now treats data rights as a central part of fair competition—banning unauthorized harvesting, coercive acquisition, and the weaponizing of platform algorithms to kneecap rivals.
This isn’t China suddenly finding religion on fair play. It’s about keeping their digital economy competitive, making sure innovation happens in the open market—not in the shadows. And it’s a reminder that when governments feel the growth engine sputtering, they’re suddenly a lot more interested in protecting the people who actually build the engines.
For companies doing business in China, this is both a shield and a warning. It’s a shield against bad-faith actors who’ve been gaming the system for years. But it’s also a warning that compliance just got more complicated—and “we didn’t know that was illegal” won’t fly after October 15.