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The Morning Risk Report: China’s Tech Clampdown Is Spreading Like Wildfire

By Dylan Tokar

 

A man checks his phone in Beijing. The Chinese government is making an effort to clean up how the country’s fast-growing tech sector operates.
PHOTO: MARK SCHIEFELBEIN/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The latest salvos in China’s campaign against its tech companies make one thing clear: Jack Ma’s businesses aren’t the only ones under the regulatory microscope, The Wall Street Journal's Stephanie Yang reports.

What started out as a government crackdown on anticompetitive practices among Chinese internet giants has grown into a broader effort to clean up how the country’s fast-growing—and, until recently, freewheeling—tech sector operates.

[Continued below...]

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Not a week seems to go by without Chinese regulators calling out tech companies for alleged offenses ranging from inconsistent pricing to imperiling user privacy to difficult working conditions. In May, China’s cyber regulator accused 105 apps, including short-video and job-recruitment apps, of illegally collecting and using personal data. It ordered the companies to fix their problems within three weeks or risk legal action.

The directives came days after another 117 apps were told to fix user-data problems. Regulators have also met with ride-hailing services for potential mistreatment of drivers, while internet firms have been ordered to reform their data and lending practices. Authorities have also criticized delivery platforms over what they view as deceptive pricing tactics.

  • Chinese Internet Regulators Investigate Startup After Tiananmen Square Anniversary Post
  • Microsoft’s Bing Temporarily Blocked Searches of Tiananmen Square ‘Tank Man’ Image
 
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From Risk & Compliance Journal

President Biden’s administration has kicked off an interagency process in which a range of departments and agencies will report to the White House on how they can strengthen efforts to fight corruption.
PHOTO: SAMUEL CORUM/PRESS POOL

Biden Ramps Up Fight Against Corruption

President Biden is making anticorruption a central pillar of his administration’s national security agenda, issuing a directive the White House said would help further collaboration between government agencies on issues including kleptocracy and illicit finance. The move could have broad implications for several anticorruption programs, including the U.S. Justice Department’s enforcement of an antiforeign bribery law, as well as for U.S. foreign policy.

Proposed Framework Aims to Guide Regulators in Decisions to Charge Chief Compliance Officers

A proposed framework guiding decisions to bring enforcement actions against financial sector chief compliance officers aims to address growing concern over the individual liability of compliance professionals. The framework, released Wednesday by the New York City Bar Association, asks regulators to evaluate 12 affirmative factors and three mitigating factors in deciding whether to charge chief compliance officers for conduct relating to their job-related duties under federal securities laws.

 

Newsletter Extra

SEC Closes Bribery Probe Into Latin American Airline Group

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has closed a probe into whether Avianca Holdings SA’s past practice of providing travel benefits to government officials may have violated a U.S. antibribery law, the airline said.

Avianca launched an internal investigation into the practice, which could have violated the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, in 2019. The company at the time also disclosed the matter to the SEC and the U.S. Justice Department.

On June 1, the SEC notified Avianca that it had concluded a probe into the matter and wouldn’t  recommend an enforcement action, the company said. Avianca didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the Justice Department’s parallel investigation.

The company last year said it was conducting a separate investigation into its relationship with Airbus SE, after the European plane maker reached a record $4 billion bribery settlement with U.S., U.K. and French authorities.

—Dylan Tokar

 

Compliance

G-7 finance ministers, including U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, meeting in London on Friday.
PHOTO: STEFAN ROUSSEAU/PRESS POOL

An agreement by wealthy countries to impose minimum taxes on multinational companies faces a rocky path to implementation, with many governments likely to wait and see what others, especially a divided U.S. Congress, will do.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen hailed the deal, reached by finance ministers of the Group of Seven leading nations over the weekend in London. She called it a return to multilateralism and a sign that countries can tighten the tax net on profitable firms to fund their governments.

The agreement represents a turning point in long-running negotiations over where and how corporate profits should be taxed. The deal would impose a minimum tax of at least 15% and give countries more authority to tax the profits of digital companies like Apple Inc. and Facebook Inc. that dominate global markets but pay relatively little tax in many countries where they operate.

 ‏‏‎ ‎
  • The head of the International Maritime Organization expects a key panel to adopt a blueprint on reducing carbon emissions at a meeting next week as the global marine regulator faces rising pressure from governments and from within its own ranks over environmental goals.
     
  • Eight of the nine senior managers who earned too much to qualify for Covid-19-related hazard pay at New Jersey’s state-run veterans nursing homes received it anyway, according to records obtained by The Wall Street Journal.
     
  • Alphabet Inc.’s Google agreed to pay a fine of nearly $270 million as part of a settlement with French regulators of one of the first antitrust cases globally to allege the tech company abused its leading role in the digital advertising sector.
     
  • Scams are running rampant in the cryptocurrency markets as a huge rally in bitcoin, a lack of regulation and the anonymity of digital money have created a ripe environment for fraudsters.
 

Risk

FBI Director Christopher Wray says recent high-profile attacks on the meat and oil industries were a fraction of the some 100 types of ransomware the FBI is investigating. NATE PALMER FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

FBI Director Christopher Wray said the agency was investigating about 100 different types of ransomware, many tracing back to hackers in Russia, and compared the current spate of cyberattacks with the challenge posed by the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“There are a lot of parallels, there’s a lot of importance, and a lot of focus by us on disruption and prevention,” Mr. Wray said in an interview Thursday. “There’s a shared responsibility, not just across government agencies but across the private sector and even the average American.”

Mr. Wray’s comments—among his first publicly since two recent ransomware attacks gripped the U.S. meat and oil-and-gas industries—come as senior Biden administration officials have characterized ransomware as an urgent national-security threat and said they are looking at ways to disrupt the criminal ecosystem that supports the booming industry.

 
  • A court decision ordering Royal Dutch Shell PLC to cut its carbon emissions has emboldened litigants in similar cases, including two that could have big implications for Exxon Mobil Corp. and French oil giant Total.
 

Audit & Accounting

The SEC on Friday removed William Duhnke as chairman of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board.
PHOTO: DENNY HENRY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday removed the chairman of the U.S. audit watchdog and took steps to replace its entire board, as the SEC’s new Democratic leader begins to shape the regulator.

The SEC, which oversees the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, said the departure of William Duhnke was effective immediately and that it appointed board member Duane DesParte to serve as acting chair. It didn’t provide a reason for the changes. Mr. Duhnke couldn’t be reached for comment.

 

Reputation

Facebook rendered the decision after its oversight board said former President Donald Trump couldn’t be suspended indefinitely.
PHOTO: EVAN VUCCI/ASSOCIATED PRESS

  • Facebook Inc. said it is suspending Donald Trump’s accounts for two years, formalizing a long-term penalty for the former U.S. president after its independent Oversight Board said the company was wrong to keep the ban open-ended.
     
  • Two major U.S. banks said they will resume campaign donations from their political-action committee, but split on the question about whether they would donate money to any of the 147 Republican lawmakers who voted to challenge the results of the 2020 election.

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About Us

Send comments to the Risk & Compliance editor, Jack Hagel, at jack.hagel@wsj.com

Subscribe to The Morning Risk Report here.

Follow us on Twitter at @WSJRisk, @_MengqiSun, and @dgtokar.

 
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