Improve the probative effect of WeChat evidence
2024-02-04
In order to clarify the recognition and acceptance standards of WeChat chat records, in line with the development of the times and the needs of people's lives, it is necessary to unify the recognition standards, strengthen technical support, and improve evidence awareness. Under the trend of evidence informatization, electronic data relying on computers and their networks is playing an increasingly important role in proving the facts of cases, and even related WeChat chat records, WeChat voice, WeChat videos and other WeChat evidence are gradually entering the judicial field. In judicial practice, there are clear regulations on how to collect WeChat evidence, as well as the methods and procedures for providing evidence, compared to the past. However, there are still many people who are not familiar with the specific operating procedures and have many doubts in actual operation, resulting in a significant gap between the use of WeChat evidence and the expected situation, which poses a challenge to the court in determining the effectiveness of WeChat evidence proof. In order to solve the problem of difficult identification of electronic evidence, including WeChat, and unify the standards for legal application, the Supreme People's Court issued the Decision of the Supreme People's Court on Amending the Several Provisions on Civil Litigation Evidence on December 26, 2019, which came into effect on May 1, 2020. The Decision clarifies that chat records on social media platforms such as WeChat, QQ, and Weibo can also serve as evidence for ordinary people to file lawsuits. Using WeChat as evidence can sometimes restore the facts of a case to the maximum extent possible, but if relevant issues are not taken seriously, its probative effect may be greatly reduced. The characteristics of WeChat evidence, such as its appearance concealment, physical fragility, tamperability, and repairability, determine that its judicial determination is different from traditional evidence. On the one hand, WeChat evidence mainly takes the form of chat records, screenshots, voice, videos, etc. The content is tedious and complex, usually reflecting a certain segment of life. It is difficult to coherently and completely record the entire facts to be proven, making it difficult to become direct evidence to prove the facts of the case. Generally, other evidence is needed to form a chain of evidence, leading to difficulty in proving the facts to be proven. On the other hand, the chat recipients on WeChat are uncertain, mostly using nicknames and network names. WeChat avatars are mostly network images, and there is a legal risk of account and avatar theft and impersonation, making it difficult to intuitively determine the identity of the parties involved. In addition, WeChat evidence exists on the WeChat platform, which determines that some audio and image materials do not have original copies and there is a risk of being deleted and difficult to save, resulting in difficulty in retaining WeChat evidence. Even if WeChat evidence can be notarized, appraised, or restored through technology, it still faces significant time and economic costs, leading to lengthy and lengthy litigation. The author believes that with the spread of informatization and big data in various aspects of social life, electronic evidence such as WeChat chat records will inevitably play an increasingly important role on the stage of judicial certification. In order to clarify the recognition and acceptance standards of WeChat chat records, and to meet the needs of the times and people's lives, the author suggests doing a good job in the following aspects: first, unifying the recognition standards. There is an urgent need for specific rules and applicable norms to guide the collection, presentation, cross examination, and authentication of evidence on WeChat in practice. It is recommended to establish specific authentication rules and applicable norms, or publish guiding cases, etc., to clarify the process of evidence collection, evidence presentation, cross examination, and authentication on WeChat, and unify WeChat evidence
Edit：Wangchen Responsible editor：Jia Jia
Source：http://rmfyb.chinacourt.org
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