Executives jailed over online pornography videos

Four executives from an online video service company have been handed jail sentences ranging from three years to three years and six months for broadcasting pornography on the internet, a Beijing court said.

Beijing Haidian District People's Court publicly announced the judgment on Tuesday and posted it on its official microblogging platform.

Wang Xin, chief executive officer of Shenzhen QVOD Technology in Guangdong province, was named as the key suspect, sentenced to three years and six months in prison, and fined 1 million yuan ($149,705).

The other three defendants were fined between 200,000 yuan and 500,000 yuan, the judgment said.

The company was ordered to pay a fine of 10 million yuan for uploading pornographic material, it added.

The four executives pleaded guilty in the second trial on Friday last week, in a change of plea from the first trial at the beginning of this year.

The court said that the defendants knew that videos uploaded on their platform contained pornography, but they chose not to intervene, adding that they also benefited financially from advertisements on such videos.

"Although the defendants said they worked for a technology company and they did not upload the videos, they had a duty to use their technical skills to examine uploaded content and maintain cybersecurity," the judgment said.