Recently, many parts of China have been hit by typhoons, heavy rain, and floods, while the internet has seen the spread of disaster-related rumors, including misappropriated content and false disaster information generated using artificial intelligence (AI). On Monday, China’s Ministry of Public Security announced 15 representative cases, with several involved netizens having received administrative penalties.
According to CCTV News' client, the Internet Security Department of the Chinese public security authorities, relying on the “Clean Net—2026” special operation, continues to strictly crack down on illegal activities related to the fabrication and dissemination of flood and other disaster-related online rumors. The 15 announced cases involve regions including Guangdong, Anhui, Gansu, and Guangxi, with multiple cases occurring in Guangdong.
The rumor-mongering methods include editing and stitching together footage of disasters from other regions, reusing old disaster videos, and using AI tools to generate or falsify information.
Among them, a 36-year-old netizen surnamed Chen in Shenzhen, Guangdong, edited and stitched together scenes of severe city damage caused by hurricanes in the United States, posted them on Douyin, and falsely claimed they depicted the disaster site of typhoon “Hongxia.” He has since been administratively punished by the local public security authorities.
Another 37-year-old netizen surnamed Chen from Shenzhen used AI tools to alter a local “Safety Notice for Delivery Workers during Typhoon” and circulated related screenshots on WeChat; a 36-year-old man named Yang from Qingyuan, Guangdong, also used AI to generate multiple fake notices about school, business, and work suspensions. Both individuals have received administrative penalties.
Previously, China’s National Cyberspace Administration’s official WeChat posted on July 23 that the Central Cyberspace Administration and the Ministry of Emergency Management jointly issued a notice deploying a nationwide campaign to intensively clean up and rectify “illegal and harmful information about disaster incidents during flood season.”
The operation will focus on rectifying five types of problems, including misappropriation and malicious editing, recycling old news or combining with historical events, exaggeration and fabrication of data, inventing dangers and impersonating authorities, and technical forgery or taking advantage of situations for fraud.
The notice requires local cyberspace authorities to focus on typical and covert issues related to illegal and harmful information about disaster incidents, conduct comprehensive screening, supervise website platforms to fulfill their primary responsibilities, and improve content review and account management mechanisms.
Every year from late July to early August is the critical period of China’s main flood season, known as the “seven down, eight up,” featuring concentrated rainfall and frequent floods. Recently, due to typhoons and sustained heavy rains, many places in China have experienced severe events such as floods, tornadoes, and landslides.
Shanghai Police: Man Detained for Posting False Information about Typhoon
According to the official Weibo account “Police-Civil Straight Access–Yangpu,” the Yangpu branch of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau released a statement on the evening of August 9, stating that a man was administratively detained for posting false information about a typhoon.
According to police investigation, on August 9, 2026, Liu (male, 32 years old) sought attention by downloading a heavy rain video released by another person on July 18, re-editing it, and posting it on his social media account, claiming “There’s another major flood in Yangpu today,” causing adverse social impact. Liu has now been administratively detained by police for fabricating facts and disrupting public order.
The police remind that the entire city is currently conducting organized anti-typhoon and flood prevention work. For those who fabricate and disseminate false information to gain attention and disrupt such efforts, the public security authorities will strictly handle such acts according to law. Citizens are urged not to forward unverified information, so as to jointly maintain a clean online environment and good social order.