China has decided to blacklist people with bad credit by putting their names and number of outstanding payments in a law enforcement data bank, according to a senior official with the Supreme People's Court (SPC).

Huang Songyou, SPC's vice president, said the data bank, with a link to the country's major bank credit system, will cooperate with government agencies that are in charge of business registration, real estate, project bidding, vehicle administration and entry and exit administration.

Once entered into the data bank, the offenders will face great difficulty in areas including financing, registering new companies, purchasing cars and real estate, contracting projects, trading and leaving the country, according to Huang.

"Establishing the data bank is one of SPC's major innovative moves", Huang said. "Every single step from the recording to the ending of the more than 2 million cases handled by courts of various levels nationwide each year will be incorporated into the database."

The general public can access the data bank's information via www.chinacourt.org, one of China's biggest websites on law.

"The only way out for these offenders is to perform their duty as soon as possible, in a bid to restore their credit," Huang said.

The Supreme People's Court has developed a detailed plan for establishing the data bank, and the software design is well underway.

Source: Xinhua