Microblogging site Sina Weibo was one of the three slapped with the streaming ban. Popular news portal site iFeng and video streaming platform ACFUN have also been ordered to stop streaming.
In February, Sina Weibo surpassed Twitter in market capitalisation, at a valuation of $11.3bn. Often referred to as “China’s Twitter”, Weibo now has 300m active monthly users. In the past year, it has made embedding live streaming video a priority, while shifting away from its traditional blog format.
The three companies did not possess the necessary licence to stream audio and visual content and were “not in line with national audiovisual regulations and propagating negative speech”, according to an announcement posted on Thursday night on the website of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT), China’s media oversight body.
The announcement did not specify whether the freeze on streaming functions was temporary or permanent.
In either case, the ban is an especially big blow for Sina Weibo, which relies heavily on video streaming to raise advertising revenues from brands and influential bloggers.
Users would now have to apply for a licence to continue video or audio streaming, according to a statement issued by the company.
The expansion into live streaming as well as mobile-friendly formats, has allowed Sina Weibo to stage a strong comeback, after slipping in its rivalry with WeChat, Tencent’s social media platform.
Sina Weibo posted net revenues of $655.8m in 2016, up 37 per cent from the previous year, largely because of a surge in live streaming advertising.
The company has also invested heavily in beefing up its live streaming capabilities. It led a $500m funding round for video streaming site Yixia last November. In December, the company announced a partnership with the National Football League to stream games directly on its platform — a lucrative partnership that is now in danger because of the streaming ban.
The abrupt halt on video and audio streaming comes as China steps up its policing of internet content, particularly content it deems salacious. Earlier this month, more than 60 social media accounts, some on Weibo and including many celebrity gossip channels, were shut down for disseminating “vulgar content” and “negatively impacting society”.
Meanwhile, a new cyber security law that took effect in June now mandates that any data relating to national security must be held on Chinese servers and large data transfers abroad must first be reviewed.
