"This corn is really delicious!" "I've used this foundation, and it's very good. "The streamer is amazing!" ......
Have you ever seen such comments in the live broadcast room? But you may not think that those "praises" and "praises" on the screen may be sent by a brusher operating dozens of accounts at the same time.
Drainage, interaction, promotion, and follower ...... It may all be a "routine".
Recently, the People's Procuratorate of Yinzhou District, Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province accepted the first batch of cases in Zhejiang that were convicted of illegal business operations for inflating the popularity of the live broadcast room by manipulating software. Among them, after Wang was prosecuted by the procuratorate, he was finally sentenced to one year and three months in prison, suspended for one year and six months, and fined 50,000 yuan for the crime of illegal business operation.
The audience in the live broadcast room is a "dummy"?
"As long as you buy a mobile phone to build a computer room, and then use the software to manipulate the mobile phone, automatically enter a designated live broadcast room, you don't need to do anything, as long as the mobile phone is 'hanging' in the live broadcast room to attract popularity, you can make money......" At the end of 2022, by chance, Wang heard from a friend that it is very profitable to brush traffic in the live broadcast room to "help".
After hearing this, Wang was very moved, and immediately purchased a large number of mobile phones, routers, switches and other network equipment, circumvention tools and "cloud control software" from a technology company in Changsha, set up group control computer rooms in many places in Yinzhou District, and hired Yang Moumou and others as staff to operate the order-taking system and group control software. Thinking that he could make a lot of money, the "heroic" Wang also invited Zhang and several other friends to "do a big job" together.
The picture shows the mobile phone purchased by Wang
In recent years, the illegal activities of "cyber trolls" have taken on some new characteristics. Different from the previous form of "pulling people's heads" into the live broadcast room to increase popularity, Wang only needs to use the "cloud control software" on the computer to control thousands of mobile phones in the computer room to automatically enter the designated live broadcast room, and carry out tasks such as following, liking, and commenting. Under the manipulation of software, hundreds or even thousands of mobile phones instantly poured into the same live broadcast room, and the popularity of the original single digits immediately skyrocketed, attracting more "wild" traffic.
In Wang's studio, there is a physical computer room, densely packed with thousands of mobile phones, once receiving an order to increase false popularity, Wang uses control software to let a large number of mobile phones in the computer room enter the designated live broadcast room to "fill people's heads and increase popularity", and finally settle illegal profits according to the time of entering the live broadcast room and the number of mobile phones.
The picture shows that there are multiple mobile phones "working" together in the computer room.
Wang explained: "A mobile phone charges 6.65 yuan a day, and the two studios add up to almost 4,600 mobile phones, and they work intermittently for three or four months." From November 2022 to March 2023, in less than 4 months, the income was nearly 3 million yuan.
Wang was sentenced to one year and three months
After investigation, the accounts in the live broadcast room of the short video platform logged in by these mobile phones were all purchased in bulk by Wang from others, and they were fake accounts without real-name authentication by the live broadcast platform. But even if it is seized by the platform, you can make a comeback as long as you re-register.
The picture shows Wang's studio
In this regard, the prosecutor in charge of the case said: "There are certain loopholes in the account management of live broadcast platforms, and the phenomenon of buying and selling fake accounts is rampant, resulting in criminals having loopholes. Moreover, criminal gangs were able to buy thousands of mobile phones at low prices for manipulation, and the source of their mobile phone purchases was suspicious, which also exposed the possibility of illegal and criminal activities in the mobile phone recycling market. ”
So, how should Wang's behavior of using manipulative software to inflate his popularity be characterized?
The undertaker of the Yinzhou District People's Procuratorate said that Wang and others violated state regulations by using batch control software for the purpose of making profits, and providing others with services such as publishing fictitious comments and likes for a fee, disrupting market order, and it can be found to be "knowing that it is false information and providing services such as publishing information through information networks for a fee" as provided for in Article 7 of the "Interpretation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in Handling Criminal Cases Involving the Use of Information Networks to Commit Defamation", and should be convicted and punished as the crime of illegal business operations.
In the process of handling the case of Wang and others' illegal business, the Yinzhou District People's Procuratorate performed its legal supervision duties to prosecute 8 people, a total of 17 people in this series of cases entered the procuratorate review and prosecution stage, and 10 people have been convicted by the court, of which Wang was prosecuted by the procuratorate, and was finally sentenced to one year and three months in prison, suspended for one year and six months, and fined 50,000 yuan.
The prosecutor reminded
Cyberspace is not a place outside the law
Although the "Internet water army" is nothing new, it has grown savagely with the development of the Internet in recent years, and has gradually changed from "individual combat" to "large-scale team combat" at the beginning.
"There are many ways for online trolls to behave, in addition to 'grabbing popularity' in live streaming and 'swiping praise' on shopping websites, there are also online violence types that publish insults, slander and other information, or types of paid deletion of negative information and comments hired by enterprises or individuals, and some are rumor-mongering, fabricating false and eye-catching information or rumors to achieve hype, drainage and other purposes. Relevant procuratorial officers and police introduced.
In this regard, the prosecutor reminded that cyberspace is not a place outside the law, and the behavior of "cyber trolls" is not only illegal, but may also be suspected of criminal offenses. In daily life, if consumers and parties discover these violations of laws and regulations, they can report them to the relevant platforms or management departments in a timely manner in accordance with the law.
Source: Rule of Law Daily Editor: Xiao M