Hanoi (VNA) - The Vietnamese Government will impose fines of up to 50 million VND (about 1,900 USD) on social media users who share fabricated or false information, as part of a broad new decree aimed at tightening control over digital platforms.
The decree, spanning eight chapters and 117 articles, details administrative violations, penalty levels, remedial measures, and the authorities empowered to issue sanctions and write up violation reports across postal services, telecommunications, radio frequencies, e-transactions, information technology (IT), and civilian cryptography under cybersecurity management.
Who gets punished
Sanctions apply to Vietnamese organisations, business households, and individuals, as well as foreign entities and individuals that commit the stipulated administrative violations.
Liable organisations include enterprises, branches, and units in telecom, radio frequency, e-transaction, and IT sectors, as well as agents that provide postal, internet, and online gaming services. Also included are representative offices of foreign postal providers, public telecom and internet access points, operators of public online gaming venues, and mobile content service suppliers.
The net also catches broadcasters, public service units, social organisations, professional associations using radio frequencies, foreign non-governmental organisations using radio frequencies, domain-name registrars, operators of new generic top-level domains in Vietnam, information system operators, state agencies acting outside their assigned management functions, electronic signature providers, foreign e-signature authentication services, entities that recognise foreign signatures and certificates, any organisation violating rules in the decree’s scope, and firms trading, exporting, or importing civilian cryptographic products and services.
Fines of 20–30 million VND for banned content, ads
For social media users, the decree mandates fines of 20-30 million VND for exploiting platforms for prohibited conduct. That includes supplying or sharing fabricated, false, distorted, or defamatory content that harms the reputation of agencies, organisations, or individuals; promoting social vices, prostitution, or human trafficking; publishing obscene or depraved materials; and disseminating materials that damage national traditions, social ethics, or public health if it stops short of criminal prosecution.
The same range covers sharing graphic images of killings, violence, accidents, horror, or disturbing scenes; distributing journalistic, literary, artistic, or published works without the rights holder’s permission or materials banned from circulation; advertising or pushing prohibited goods and services; posting maps of Vietnam that misrepresent national sovereignty; and sharing links to outlawed online content.
Additional violations include using social media to produce content to mimic journalistic reports, investigations, or interviews. Press agencies that fail to inform authorities when setting up accounts, pages, channels, or groups on domestic or foreign social platforms, and account owners or administrators who fail to remove unlawful or harmful content, including material affecting children, when ordered by competent agencies.
Up to 50 million VND for distorting history, leaking secrets
The decree stiffens penalties to 30–50 million VND for sharing content that distorts history, denies revolutionary achievements, undermines great national unity, insults religions, or incites gender or racial discrimination, provided no criminal liability is triggered.
The same 30–50 million VND bracket applies to disclosing state secrets, personal privacy, or other confidential information below the threshold for criminal charges, and spreading false information that causes public panic, damages socio-economic activities, disrupts state agencies or public officials, or infringes on the lawful rights and interests of organisations and individuals.
The decree will take effect on July 1, 2026./.
