Social media account owners will have to authenticate to post and livestream.

Decree 147 on management, provision and use of the Internet and online information was issued by the Government last weekend, replacing Decrees 72/2013 and 27/2018.

One of the changes is to manage cross-border information provision for services with large traffic of over 100,000 per month or using data storage services in Vietnam.

Accordingly, service providers will have to authenticate social network user accounts using phone numbers in Vietnam. In cases where phone numbers cannot be used, social networks will have to request authentication using personal identification numbers, in accordance with the law on electronic identification and authentication.

Previously, Decree 27/2018 stipulated that social network users can authenticate with email address or phone number when registering or changing information.

"Ensure that only verified accounts are allowed to post information (write articles, comment, livestream) and share information on social networks," the decree states.

In addition, these units must also store information of service users from Vietnam when registering an account, including: Full name, date of birth, phone number in Vietnam or personal identification number.

For active users, verification will have to be done within 90 days of the decree coming into effect.

In the case of users under 16 years of age, parents or guardians will register with their own information and are responsible for monitoring and managing children's access to and posting of information.

Users have the right to decide whether or not to allow the use of information for advertising purposes.

For illegal content, service providers must block and remove the illegal content within 24 hours of receiving a request from a competent authority.

For accounts, pages, community groups, and content channels that frequently have violating content (5 times in 30 days or 10 times in 90 days requested to be removed by the Ministry of Information and Communications or the Ministry of Public Security), social networks will have to temporarily block these pages for 7 to 30 days, preventing access from Vietnamese users.

In case an account, page, group, or channel is temporarily locked three times or posts content that violates national security, the social network will have to permanently block access from Vietnam.

The Decree takes effect from December 25.