China video streaming execs stand trial for pornography

BEIJING - Four executives of Chinese online video service Qvod stood trial on Thursday and Friday in Beijing, charged with spreading pornography for profit.

Wang Xin, former CEO of the Shenzhen-based company, and three others denied the charge during the two-day open trial at Haidian District People's Court.

According to the prosecution, 21,251 of 29,841 files which police obtained from three servers related to Qvod in Haidian were pornographic.

But Wang claimed the company itself was not responsible for spreading information. He blamed the pornographic content on third parties.

The court will announce verdicts later for the three defendants, who could receive a sentence up to life in prison under Chinese law.

Founded in 2007, Qvod offered videos through peer-to-peer video streaming technology and its user base quickly grew to 300 million.

The four executives knew that a large amount of pornography was uploaded, downloaded and watched, according to prosecutors.

In June 2014, the company was fined 260 million yuan ($39.6 million) for copyright infringement and its license was revoked.