The State Administration of Radio Film and Television (SARFT) today announced the results of its inspection on numerous online video sites, which was carried out in the 3-month period ending March 20, 2008.

China’s Ministry of Information Industries recently issued a new rule prompting cell phone makers to adopt a unified standard in cell phone data storage and transfer. The new rule mostly applies to user data such as contact list and message history and will allow users to seamlessly transfer these data from one phone to the other regardless of phone’s brand or model.

State owned China National Radio station reported yesterday that the Chinese government is planning on announcing the rumored plans to restructure telecom industry. According to the report, China’s

Last Friday the Motion Picture Association announced that six of its member companies have filed a law suit against Shenzhen Xunlei Networking Technology Co. Ltd (Xunlei or Thunder) for copyright infringement and demanded over 7 million RMB ($1 million) in damages. The companies also demand Xunlei’s pledge to refrain from future infringements.

According to the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC), more than 2,300 companies have completed their transition to using legitimate software exclusively. Since April 2006, NCAC and eight other government agencies started a campaign to prompt Chinese companies to abandon pirated software.

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) announced yesterday that it has brought new legal proceedings against Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) for its delivery of “deep links” to hundreds of thousands of infringing tracks on third party sites.  Separate actions have been brought to Sohu (NASDAQ: SOHU) and its search engine Sogou.  In addition, Yahoo China faces new proceedings after it refuses to comply with a court ruling in December 2007 against its copyright infringement.

Popular Chinese download management tool provider Thunder was ruled guilty by the Shanghai Pudong District Court for providing an illegal download link to Chinese movie Shang Cheng. Thunder was found in violation of the copyright law for providing a direct link to illegally download the movie.

At the end of 2007, China’s Ministry of Information Industry (MII) issued a law requiring online video sharing sites to have controlling interests owned by state enterprises. The law was put into effect on January 31, 2008.

As part of China’s WTO entrance agreement, the Ministry of Information Industry recently announced the new tariff schedule, which showed decreases on 83 categories of electronics. The tariff reduction included various key components for the production of consumer electronics including LCD parts and camera lenses.

Local media reported today that the Chinese government is reopening the application for Internet café licenses across the country. In addition, the new application process will be simpler and the government will implement more policies to support the growth of Internet cafes, especially those with chain operations.