Complete the PSB Filing (PSB registration) for a Chinese website

The ICP application, for a website that is publicly accessible on the Internet in China, is not yet complete with the receipt of the ICP Filing or the Commercial ICP license. Since 2016, you must register with the Public Security Bureau (PSB) within 30 days of receiving your ICP license in China.

Although your website may not yet be available via a server in China during your ICP application process, the website must be accessible in China for the PSB Filing process. This is because the PSB also takes a thorough look at your website and checks that it does not contain any illegal content or content that you are not allowed to publish with your ICP license type.

The legal basis for PSB Filing are the "Computer Information Network International Network Security Protection Management Measures" (计算机信息网络国际联网安全保护管理办法) and the "Internet Information Service Unit Network Security Responsibility Notice" (互联网信息服务单位网络安全责任告知书).

Requirements & Completion of PSB Filing

The so-called PSB Filing (PSB registration, also known as PSB Bei'An or psb备案) can be completed entirely online via the PSB website. However, as this is an official government website of the Chinese state, it is only available in Chinese and you must therefore submit your data in Chinese. To initiate the process, you must first register on the PSB's website at https://beian.mps.gov.cn/. You can then start the PSB Filing process directly, for which you have to provide information about your company, your website, the person responsible for it, your hosting solution and the registrar of your domain. During your ICP application, you will already have collected a large part of the data and documents required; however, there is some additional information that you need for the PSB Filing:

• In addition to the scan of the Chinese identity card of the person responsible for the website, which you should already have, a picture of the person holding the identity card in their hand is also required. On this picture, both the head of the person and the front of the identity card must be clearly visible.
• The information provided by the person responsible for the website must indicate the period of validity of the identity card. This is usually noted on the back of a Chinese identity card.
• You must also state since when the website has been accessible on the Internet.

Since the PSB will look at both the submitted data and the content on your website after submission, your website must already be publicly accessible in China at that time and your ICP number must be visible in the footer of the website. Once you have completed all the pages of the online form and ensured that your site is publicly accessible, you can submit the PSB Filing for review by the Public Security Bureau.

As a rule, you will receive a reply within three to five working days via SMS to the Chinese mobile number you provided when you created your account. This will either inform you that the PSB has successfully issued the permit or inform you of problems that need to be resolved before resubmitting. If the verification of your data was not successful, the PSB provides you with the possibility to discuss the additional information and required changes to the data or the website during an on-site appointment at the PSB office in China. By the way, the SMS messages from the Public Security Bureau are sent in Chinese.

Integration in your Chinese website

After the PSB Filing process has been successfully completed, you will need to log in again on the official PSB website at https://beian.mps.gov.cn/  with your account. There you can retrieve the filing details and obtain the corresponding PSB registration number. The registration number has the format "沪公网安备 12345678901234号". The first character indicates the province in which the ICP Filing was issued (in this example 沪 for Shanghai). The subsequent characters "公网安备" indicate that this information relates to the PSB Filing. This is followed by a sequence of numbers that uniquely identifies the PSB Filing. At the end, you will find the character "号", which simply means "number".

According to Article 5 of the "Internet Information Service Unit Network Security Responsibility Notice" the PSB number together with the logo of the PSB must be placed on all pages of your Chinese website in a visible place on your website, and both the number and the logo must be linked to "https://beian.mps.gov.cn/#/query/webSearch?code=[registration number]". Since the ICP number must be placed in the footer of the website, it is usual to integrate the PSB number next to it. Both the PSB's logo and an HTML file with sample code for inclusion on your website can be downloaded directly via your account on the PSB website.

If you decide to use the hosting and server solutions of weber.cloud China, we will assist you in applying for your ICP Filing and take care of all the necessary activities.

Do you have further questions?

Then visit our FAQ section or send us a message using the comment function at the bottom of this page - we will be happy to assist you and answer any questions you may have.

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