【Epoch Times December 9, 2025】Due to high risk of fraud in Xiaohongshu in Taiwan, the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of China has ordered a temporary restriction for one year. Deputy Minister of the Interior, Ma Shiyuan, stated that the government is collaborating with major entities such as Meta to combat fraud effectively. Anticipating that fraud groups will move to the unregulated Xiaohongshu with rapidly increasing users, the government must take proactive measures to manage risks and not wait for a surge of fraud cases to intervene.
Regarding the fraud patterns on Xiaohongshu, Deputy Minister of the Interior Ma Shiyuan pointed out that various types of scams seen on other platforms, such as fake investments and online shopping scams, also exist on Xiaohongshu. However, a unique form of fraud on Xiaohongshu is “intellectual property fraud,” where individuals pretend to partner in business, obtain proposals or designs from Taiwanese people, and then steal the creativity, replicating it in China without permission. This often leaves Taiwanese victims with no recourse for help.
On the 4th, Ma Shiyuan stated that the Chinese social platform Xiaohongshu failed security inspections and was involved in over 1,706 fraud cases, totaling more than NT$240 million (approximately 0.08 billion US dollars) in the past two years. Despite sending letters with no responses, the Ministry invoked Article 42 of the Fraud Prevention Act, issuing an order to suspend internet access or restrict access for a preliminary period of one year.
In an interview with Central News Agency on the 8th, Ma Shiyuan indicated that the government has been actively combatting various fraud techniques to reduce the likelihood of individuals falling victim to scams. Collaborating with Meta, Google, Line, and TikTok, the government has been proactive in taking down various fraudulent advertisements.
According to Ma Shiyuan’s statistics from August of last year to present, the government requested the takedown of over 110,000 ads from Meta, over 4,000 ads from Google, and over 90,000 fraudulent accounts from Line. Additionally, TikTok removed over 10,000 ads upon request. Almost every month, the government meets with these four major platforms to address issues and risks, encouraging adjustments from the companies, such as the removal of fraudulent ads within 24 hours, providing information on criminal accounts and IP locations. Line can even track records for a certain number of days to assist in criminal group investigations.
Ma Shiyuan stated that the government’s collaboration with the four major entities has shown results. From August last year until now, the number of financial losses from fraudulent buyer scams and investment scams has decreased by 80% and 70%, respectively. However, he emphasized that fraud groups will not sit idle and will shift their operations. Apart from the rise in online shopping scams, the next target for fraud groups is the unregulated Xiaohongshu.
Analyzing the situation, Ma Shiyuan highlighted that Xiaohongshu is the only large social platform that facilitates unrestricted communication between Mainland China and Taiwan and remains unregulated. Just last year, Xiaohongshu gained one million users in Taiwan, bringing the total user count to three million. With extensive advertising efforts on various social media platforms, it is expected that the user count will soon reach five million, drawing the attention of fraud groups.
Ma Shiyuan mentioned that Xiaohongshu failed in all 15 cybersecurity evaluation criteria, including collecting personal information, exceeding usage permissions, and capturing biological traits. This implies that users’ personal data such as images, voices, phone numbers, emails, and financial information are all under the platform’s control. Though the exact purpose of this information remains unclear, if individuals are impersonated by artificial intelligence, engage in illegal activities, or deepfake videos emerge, Taiwanese citizens may be held accountable, and the government may be unable to offer assistance.
Recognizing this, the government, on October 14th, for the first time through the Straits Exchange Foundation, requested Xiaohongshu’s parent company Chin…