Fearing retaliation from the government, a number of Chinese social media platforms have moved to delete or restrict NFTs from their websites. Companies are concerned that their operating licenses in China may be revoked as the Chinese government tightens down on crypto-related services. China began a crackdown on bitcoin mining last year. In recent months, the country has tightened laws on the bitcoin industry.
“Under the background that the compliance of digital collections is not clear, many platforms have begun to actively crack down on violations to prevent further fermentation of related behaviors,” Cointelegraph stated a local media.
The Chinese social media giant WeChat is one of numerous platforms that has changed its policy to restrict NFTs. According to sources, the company has canceled the accounts of several digital collectibles websites for violating the rules. Xihu No.1, a nationwide NFT effort, is one such example. Xihu No.1 approached Tencent, the parent company of WeChat, according to sources. The account was later determined to have been moved to an unopened portion of the WeChat software.
WeChat has also banned the mini-programs of digital collectibles Dongyiyuandian and TheOne.art, as well as West Lake No 1, a digital collector mini-program from Wensli, a silk product firm, according to Yahoo Finance. WeChat refused to allow the program because it fell under one of the unopened mini-program service categories.
Jingtan, an NFT platform run by Alibaba’s Ant Group, has changed its policies in the meanwhile. The company seems to have declared over-the-counter NFT transactions a criminal violation. It said it would “alert the police and turn over [data] to judicial authorities” if users engaged in illegal activities outside of the site.
