HUANGZHOU, China (AFP) — Artificial-intelligence judges, cyber courts, and verdicts delivered on chat apps — welcome to China's brave new world of justice.
China is encouraging digitization to streamline case-handling within its sprawling court system, using cyberspace and technologies like blockchain and cloud computing, China's Supreme People's Court said in a policy paper.
The efforts include a "mobile court" offered on popular social media platform WeChat that already has handled more than 3 million legal cases or other judicial procedures since its launch in March, according to the Supreme People's Court.
The paper was released this week as judicial authorities gave journalists a glimpse inside a cyber court — the country's first — established in 2017 in the eastern city of Hangzhou to deal with legal disputes that have a digital aspect.
In a demonstration, authorities showed how the Hangzhou Internet Court operates, featuring an online interface, with litigants appearing by video chat as an AI judge — complete with on-screen avatar — prompts them to present their cases.
"Does the defendant have any objection to the nature of the judicial blockchain evidence submitted by the plaintiff?" the black-robed virtual judge sitting under China's national emblem asked in a pretrial meeting.
"No objection," a human plaintiff answered.
Cases handled at the Hangzhou court include online trade disputes, copyright cases and e-commerce product liability claims. Litigants can register their civil complaints online and log on later for their court hearing.
Putting simple functions like that in the hands of the virtual judge helps ease the burden on human justices, who monitor the proceedings and make the major rulings in each case, officials said.
The digitization push is partly to help courts keep up with a growing caseload created by mobile payments and e-commerce in China, which has the world's largest number of mobile internet users — around 850 million.
Concluding cases “at a faster speed is a kind of justice, because justice delayed is justice denied," Hangzhou Internet Court Vice President Ni Defeng said.
Ni said the use of blockchain technology was particularly useful, helping to streamline and create clearer records of the legal process.
Since the Hangzhou court's establishment, China has set up similar chambers in Beijing and the southern metropolis of Guangzhou.
Together, they have accepted 118,764 cases and concluded 88,401, the Supreme People's Court said.
The mobile court option on WeChat — China's leading social-media messaging platform — allows users to complete case filings, hearings and evidence exchange without physically appearing in court.
It has been launched in 12 provinces and regions, authorities said.
Courts nationwide are experimenting with a range of online tools, said Zhou Qiang, chief justice and president of the Supreme People's Court.
He told a panel on Thursday that as of October more than 90% of China's courts had handled cases online to some extent.
The legal push fits with a nationwide effort championed by President Xi Jinping to make China the world's technological leader — with heavy assistance from the government — a strategy that has caused alarm in the United States, which accuses China of stealing technology and forcing foreign companies to hand it over if they want to do business in China.
China’s efforts include construction of a massive high-tech surveillance apparatus and an ambitious effort to challenge U.S. dominance in blockchain, which China could use for everything from issuing digital money to streamlining government services and tracking loyalty to the Communist Party.
© Agence France-Presse
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