TECH NEWS – According to the China Video Game Regulatory Commission, online gamers under the age of 18 will only be allowed to play for one hour on Fridays, weekends, and holidays. Manufacturers will use facial recognition to exclude children using adult IDs.

The National Press and Publication Bureau told state news agency Xinhua that gaming will only be allowed between 8 and 9 pm. (We wonder how the tech companies will manage this, although the monitoring and identification in China are more oiled – ed.)

Earlier this month, a state media outlet branded online games as “intellectual opium”. The regulator said it would also monitor online gaming companies to check compliance with time limits. Previous rules limited children’s online play to 90 minutes a day, rising to three hours on public holidays.

The move reflects long-standing concerns about the impact of excessive gaming on young people. A month before the latest restrictions were introduced, an article in the state-run business daily said many teenagers had become addicted to online games and that this was harming them. The report has led to a sharp fall in the share value of the largest Chinese online gaming companies.

In July, Chinese gaming giant Tencent announced that it would introduce facial recognition to prevent children from playing between 22:00 and 08:00. The move was introduced because of fears that children would use the adult ID to circumvent the rules.

Source: BBC News