This month, regulators also ordered top companies to stop paying attention to profits and winning fans, and companies deemed to be ignoring the rules face the threat of punishment.
This comes at a time when broader regulations aimed at controlling the country’s influential technology industry, including strict new data security and online privacy laws and rules, restrict the ability to apply algorithms to influence users’ online activities.
At the same time, the Chinese Communist government hunts down celebrities and music icons, accusing them of promoting “abnormal aesthetics” and unhealthy values among Chinese youth.
The two companies said in a statement on Thursday that they will not run ads featuring “illegal or immoral” celebrities.
These companies have tightened restrictions on minors. Tencent launched a facial recognition “Midnight Patrol” feature in July to eliminate children pretending to be adults to avoid curfew.
But determined young gamers continue to look for ways to circumvent the rules, using gaming accounts registered in the names of adults — the two companies said Thursday that they will end this practice.
