Chinese lawmaker proposes government-led age rating system

Zhu Yongxin, a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), proposed a rating system for online games.

This is according to Abacus, which cites The Beijing News.

China doesn’t have a dedicated regulatory body similar to the US Entertainment Software Rating Board, to assign age ratings to games. So far, it has been up to individual companies like Tencent and NetEase to verify the age of users and limit play time for minors.

According to Zhu Yongxin, a third-party organisation should be set up to review online games by type of content, verification methods, playtime and spending. Based on that, online games should be classified into categories such as early education, controlled, limited and prohibited. The lawmaker has also called on the national cultural and news authorities to supervise the system once it’s put in place.