Qihoo 360 designing system to monitor online trading

China's industry and commerce authorities recently entrusted a Beijing high-tech company to create a supervision system to help regulate online trading.

Qihoo 360 Technology signed an agreement with State-level and Beijing administrations for industry and commerce on June 30 to undertake the research and construction of the system, whose targets are major domestic third-party Internet trading platforms, such as Taobao, Tmall and JD.com.

According to the agreement, the system is designed to be the largest of its kind in China by integrating the information about online stores and their owners, the store owners and other related data.

It would allow cross-regional cooperation and law enforcement by authorities of industry and commerce at all levels to inspect and monitor the business operations of those platforms, aiming to solve such problems as intellectual property infringement and false promotion during online transactions.

The first phase of the system, which will be put into trial operation this year, focuses on online commodity trading. The second phase will highlight online information transactions and the third will focus on trading on intelligent mobile equipment such as smartphones, China News Service reported.

Statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics show that last year China's online trading volume accounted for nearly 11 percent of total retail sales of consumer goods.

The rapid development of the e-commerce industry, however, has also resulted in rampant online infringements and trading fraud. For example, more than 37 percent of Internet users experienced fraud at e-commerce websites, according to the Beijing Cyber Security and Anti-fraud Alliance.

The lack of cyber integrity is a serious problem, said Qi Xiangdong, president of Qihoo 360, at the signing ceremony, adding that the involvement of governmental agencies could solve the problem effectively.

Qihoo 360, founded in 2005, is a leading provider of Internet and mobile security products.

Its security systems now protect its users nationwide against Trojan malware 225 million times per day, block phishing sites 66 million times each day and identify 13 million suspicious cell phone messages, Science and Technology Daily reported.

The company has also established partnerships with other governmental agencies since 2012, such as the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Water Resources and State Administration of Taxation.

haonan@chinadaily.com.cn