BANGKOK (AFP) – Social media users in Vietnam on platforms including Facebook and TikTok will need to verify their identities as part of strict new internet regulations.
The law, which comes into force on Christmas Day, will compel tech giants operating in Vietnam to store user data, provide it to authorities on request, and remove content the government regards as “illegal” within 24 hours.
Decree 147, as it is known, builds on a 2018 cybersecurity law.
Le Quang Tu Do, of the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC), told state media that decree 147 would “regulate behaviour in order to maintain social order, national security, and national sovereignty in cyberspace”.
Aside from the ramifications for social media firms, the new laws also include curbs on gaming for under-18s, designed to prevent addiction.
Game publishers are expected to enforce a time limit of an hour per game session and not more than 180 minutes a day for all games.
A large proportion of the population is on social media, with the MIC estimating the country has around 65 million Facebook users, 60 million on YouTube and 20 million on TikTok.
Under the new laws, these tech titans — along with all “foreign organisations, enterprises and individuals” — must verify users’ accounts via their phone numbers or Vietnamese identification numbers, and store that information alongside their full name and date of birth.
They should provide it on demand to the MIC or the powerful ministry of public security.
The decree also says that only verified accounts can livestream, impacting the exploding number of people earning a living through social commerce on sites such as TikTok.
Neither Facebook parent company Meta, YouTube owner Google, nor TikTok replied to requests for comment from AFP.
