Criminal and legal protection of cyber virtual property in modern China

Abstract

With the rapid development of Internet technologies, the term “virtual property” is increasingly attracting public attention. From game gold coins and game weapons that originally exist in online games, to the virtual currency represented by Tencent Q coins, also to the current bitcoin, etc. Their forms and functions are becoming more diverse, at the same time, their impact on people's lives is also increasing. In recent years, there has been a gradual increase in cases of violations of virtual property rights in cyberspace. The Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China directly included virtual property in the sphere of protection, but there are no clear provisions on this in the criminal legislation of the country yet. New types of cybercrime cases create problems for the application of traditional elements of crimes. How exactly to apply criminal legislation to regulate violations of virtual property has become an urgent problem. In this article, in the aspects of Chinese legislation and judicial practice on the protection of virtual property, a comprehensive analysis of the relevant controversial issues in the field of criminal protection of cyber-virtual property is carried out. According to the author, the Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China contains only guidelines on virtual property and does not clearly give its legal nature. At the same time, gaps in the regulation of Chinese criminal legislation on the protection of virtual property have created a dilemma in judicial practice regarding the application of laws to violations of virtual property. After the Amendments to the Criminal Code of the People’s Republic of China No. 7 introduced into the criminal legislation the corpus delicti – “Illegal acquisition of computer information system data” (Part 2 of Article 285), the question of the application of the criminal law in relation to the illegal acquisition of virtual property caused a heated discussion. It seems that it is necessary to classify virtual property based on its content so that law enforcement officers can accurately understand the legal attributes of various virtual objects and provide them with appropriate criminal protection.