Chat evidence

Chat logs and instant messages could become evidence in Chinese courts, officials say to keep up with the times.

Several sources are reporting that China may change its civil court procedure law to allow inclusion of chat logs and direct messages on services like QQ and Weibo as evidence. The reports say this law hasn't been updated in 20 years and currently there's no mechanism on how to include more modern forms of communication as court evidence in civil cases, even though deals are often done through electronic means these days. The proposed amendment is open for public comment.

What China also lacks is a comprehensive privacy protection law, however, so it's unclear who would have access to the messages beyond those involved in the conversation, and how they might go about retrieving them. Many of China's most savvy Internet users have already abandoned the idea of any privacy in electronic communications.