China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has called on e-commerce sites to curb text-message marketing ahead of the country’s annual 11.11 shopping festival.

Detail:

The representatives from e-commerce companies Alibaba, JD, Pingduoduo, Meituan as well as relative telecommunication firm have joined the meeting held by MIIT.

MIIT pointed out that consumers compliant about spam text message and marketing during 11.11 shopping festival period have surged over the past few years. The consumer complaint related to e-commerce platforms account for 90% of total, these e-commerce platforms violated consumer interests by using loopholes to send text-message promotions to registered users without consent.

MIIT emphasized that e-commerce platforms should acknowledge their wrongdoings and take social responsibilities of managing their ecosystems, strictly adhere to E-commerce law of the People’s Republic of China and civil law, check and correct these noisy text-message marketing activities as soon as possible.

MIIT's meeting comes amid a year-long regulatory campaign on tech sectors in China, with authorities imposing restrictions and fines to companies who has involved in monopoly business practices, as well as increased scrutiny of gaming, online education and crypto-currency industries.

Context:

Launched by Alibaba in 2019, 11.11 shopping festival started off  just 27 merchants to participate the event to raise their brand awareness and promote their brands online. The shopping festival evolved and grew rapidly since then, more than 250,000 brands participated in 11.11 shopping festival this year, of which 31,000 are overseas brands.

The shopping festival is not just a big shopping day for huge discounts on everything from daily necessities to luxury items, but also it has become an annual global entertainment gala.