BEIJING, May 10 -- The Hefei Intermediate People's Court has announced that it would adjudicate China's first internet sex crime, the so-called 99BBS, on May 11th.

    At the end of last year, under the leadership of the Ministry of Public Security, the Anhui Provincial Department of Public Security mobilized its internet police and security personnel and arrested twelve suspected criminals throughout the country after doggedly pursuing the case for more than one month. The arrests broke the backbone of the internet criminal enterprise operating in China, forcing the closure of the gang's websites.

    The criminals were accused of using offshore computer servers to perpetrate crimes, operating in more than a dozen provinces and cities and registering more than three hundred thousand users and logging more than 400 million cumulative visits on its website.

    The 99BBS case is, to date, the biggest of its kind involving the most registered internet users cracked by public security bureaus. The police also arrested the largest number of webmasters and internet staff and the case involved the most serious pornographic material. It is the first case cracked by Chinese authorities that concerns internet pornography perpetuated by criminals inside and outside China.

(Source: chinanews.cn)