ChinaSupreme People's Court Opinions of 8 December 2022: AI output is reference only, judges remain fully accountable, users may decline AI assistance, and security, lawfulness, fairness and transparency principles apply. The Opinions set targets of integrated AI support by 2025 and a full framework by 2030.
Regulation Tracker · Country · Asia-Pacific
China
Substantialcivil lawupdated 2026-09-04verified 2026-09-04
As of 4 September 2026 China governs court AI top-down. The Supreme People's Court Opinions of 8 December 2022 make AI auxiliary only and forbid it from substituting for judges. The Cyberspace Administration's generative-AI measures and content-labelling rules apply horizontally. A Beijing Tongzhou case in the national Case Database sets consequences for AI-fabricated filings.
As of 2026-09-04, China has 5 binding rules, official guidance in 0 categories, 0 proposals and 4 positions set only by case law across the 20 categories in the map. Binding rules cover judges' use of AI, AI barred from deciding cases, courts' own AI deployment, horizontal AI statute, vendor due diligence. In 9 categories we found nothing; in 2 the position is not yet determined.
How to read this page
- Binding rule Binding rule means a rule in force from a court, statute, regulator or equivalent authority.
- Official guidance Official guidance means an official non-binding position from a judiciary, regulator, bar or public body.
- Proposed / consultation Proposed / consultation means a public bill, draft rule or consultation that is not yet in force.
- Set by case law Set by case law means no rule was found, but courts have set the position in decisions.
- Nothing found Nothing found means the category was checked and no rule, guidance, proposal or case-law position was found.
- Not yet determined Not yet determined means research did not establish a reliable position yet.
The rules, category by category
The Supreme People's Court auxiliary-adjudication principle: AI shall not substitute for the judge in any case, and results are supplementary references only.
The Supreme People's Court Opinions mandate smart-court AI integration, with full support targeted by 2025 and a regulatory framework by 2030, subject to auxiliary-only, security and transparency principles.
The Interim Measures for the Management of Generative AI Services, issued 10 July 2023 and in force 15 August 2023, require security assessment, algorithm filing, lawful training data and labelling, and are supplemented by the labelling measures in force from 1 September 2025. There is no justice-specific risk tier.
The Supreme People's Court Opinions require judicial AI products to be lawfully developed, examined by authoritative bodies, and to disclose their capabilities and limitations. This applies to courts' own systems rather than to law firms.
Beijing Tongzhou District People's Court, selected for the People's Court Case Database in December 2025: a lawyer filed two AI-fabricated precedents; the court wrote criticism into the judgment and stated that litigants submitting unverified AI-generated cases bear consequences, from criticism to fines under Civil Procedure Law article 114 in serious cases.
The Case Database entry from Tongzhou applies to litigation participants generally, and a Hubei Dawu County court admonished a self-represented plaintiff who filed AI-watermarked fabricated utility-bill photographs in November 2025.
No AI-specific evidence rule; courts have sanctioned AI-fabricated evidence in Dawu County in November 2025 and Taizhou in December 2025. The Cyberspace Administration labelling measures in force from 1 September 2025 require explicit and metadata labels on AI-generated content, which aids authentication.
The Tongzhou District court criticised counsel in the judgment without a fine because the consequences were minor; Case Database guidance from December 2025 anticipates fines under Civil Procedure Law article 114 for serious cases, and Dawu County issued an admonishment for AI-fabricated evidence in November 2025.
No rule requiring disclosure of AI use in filings found as of 4 September 2026.
No All China Lawyers Association or Ministry of Justice guidance on client data in AI tools found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule, guidance or reported case found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule, guidance or reported case found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule, guidance or reported case found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule, guidance or reported case found as of 4 September 2026.
No ruling or regulation on consumer AI legal products found as of 4 September 2026.
No legal-sector-specific guidance. The Personal Information Protection Law of 2021 and the Cyberspace Administration interim measures, which protect user inputs and grant deletion rights, apply generally.
No mandatory AI training found as of 4 September 2026.
The All China Lawyers Association site lists only an industry-observation article on AI; no guidance was located before the research budget ran out, and lawyer-facing AI guidance could not be confirmed either way.
CIETAC and SCIA homepages showed no AI guideline on 4 September 2026; institutional AI guidelines reported in secondary sources could not be verified before the research budget ran out.
Official documents recorded for China (4)
- Beijing Tongzhou District People's Court: counsel criticised for filing AI-fabricated precedents
Tongzhou District Court · revised 2025-12-01 · verified 2026-09-04
- Measures for Labelling AI-Generated and Synthesised Content
CAC · revised 2025-03-07 · verified 2026-09-04
- Interim Measures for the Management of Generative Artificial Intelligence Services
CAC · revised 2023-07-10 · verified 2026-09-04
- Opinions on Regulating and Strengthening the Applications of Artificial Intelligence in the Judicial Field
SPC · revised 2022-12-08 · verified 2026-09-04
Court incidents on the record in China
- Yichang District Court (Hubei)2026-07-21 Warning
Cite this page
SafeLegalAI Legal AI Regulation Tracker, "China" (updated 2026-09-04, verified 2026-09-04), https://safelegalai.com/regulation/country/cn (accessed 2026-09-04). Data: CC BY 4.0.
SafeLegalAI is a research publication by Cognesio LLP, not a law firm. Nothing here is legal advice, and no lawyer–client relationship arises from reading it. Rules change; always check the official document linked on each record and take advice on your own situation. Researched and drafted with AI assistance; verified against primary sources and edited by Cognesio LLP. The linked official documents are the record — our summaries are not the law and are not legal advice.