Commercial authorities in China have fined two of the country's leading search engines for negligently displaying false and illegal adverts. The Shanghai Industrial and Commercial Bureau said that both Baidu and Sogou had been negligent in the ways in which they had published advertising for unlicensed medical services and private companies. Baidu was fined 28,000 yuan, whilst Sogou was hit by a 10,300 yuan fine. Punishments were also handed out to the hospitals which had posted the adverts despite not being qualified to offer the treatments, including fines as high as 46,000 yuan. The penalties were imposed due to rules that were passed in 2016, that made a search engine responsible for the ads that appeared on its pages. This is yet another knock-on effect of the death of a student in 2016, who died after using illegal medication he found on Baidu.Â
