Criminal-Law Regulation of Illegally Obtaining Token Data for Volume-Boosting and Comment-Manipulation

Abstract

With the prevalence of online traffic, cases involving the illegal acquisition of Token data have kept emerging. Nevertheless, multiple judicial dilemmas persist for such cybercrimes: inconsistent criteria for determining the legal nature of Tokens; widespread conviction by default under the crime of illegally obtaining computer information system data; and judicial practices that penalize only the front-end act of stealing Tokens while overlooking subsequent harms caused by volume-boosting and comment-manipulation. For such cases, special judicial interpretations targeting cyberspace should be promulgated to clarify the legal attributes of Token data and unify adjudication standards. Consideration should be given to adding a new crime of impairing online-traffic order to specifically regulate criminal acts of stealing Tokens for bulk account login to conduct volume-boosting and comment-manipulation, so as to safeguard fair competition in platform traffic. Meanwhile, adjudicative mindsets ought to be adjusted: the entire black-and-grey industry chain shall be evaluated as a whole, and conviction shall be based on the core perpetrating acts of the crimes.