Unit fighting criminal gangs urges whistleblowers to go online

The office leading the crackdown on organized crime on Tuesday urged the public to report clues about criminal gangs to its WeChat or Weibo accounts.

Reports can also be made by scanning a QR code or typing "12337" online to bring up a website. A report can be made in only three minutes using the new platforms, the office, which is under the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said on Tuesday.

The Communist Party of China Central Committee and the State Council, launched a three-year campaign in January 2018 to crack down on organized crime. As of March 31, the office had received over 190,000 tips through phone calls and letters.

But Chen Yixin, director of the office, said some problems started to appear as the campaign progressed and it was clear the reporting platform needed to be upgraded and expanded.

"We cannot conduct further investigations in some areas where we have limited evidence, while work in other areas with a large number of clues is progressing slowly," Chen said.

To solve these problems, Chen said the updated platforms adopted intelligent information systems, big data and cloud computing which are more "user-friendly". The new system can better sift through, analyze and categorize information to help avoid repeat investigations.

Each report has a code attached to it, which the whistleblowers can access to follow each step of the case, Chen said.

The office will randomly select a number of reports every month to try and verify the authenticity of cases, Chen said. He said there are checks in place to ensure that private information and reported clues are kept confidential.

There is also a section for industry information, which can be used not only as an investigatory tool, but also to analyze and find major problems in a field, which can aid decision-making.

The tips submitted to the upgraded platform will be applied in the upcoming third round of supervision on combating gang-related crime in June.

As of May, there were 22 national inspection teams headed by ministerial-level officials who visited 22 provinces and regions to ensure the smooth progress of the ongoing crackdown on gang-related crime.

The inspection teams, including public security authorities, prosecutors and representatives of the courts, will have visited every province, region and municipality by year's end. They will also revisit some areas.

As gangs and organized crime are often deeply interwoven with corruption, the campaign this year is mainly targeting local officials who protect offenders.

By the end of March, 79,018 people across the country had been prosecuted for involvement in gang-related crimes, according to the office.