China's largest city, Shanghai, will hold the media accountable for carrying misleading commercials in its latest move to crack down on fraudulent advertisements, a government spokesperson said.

Advertisers as well as publishers of fraudulent ads will face more severe penalties in the city's forthcoming campaign to better regulate the market and improve the overall credibility of the advertising industry, Jiao Yang, spokesperson for the Shanghai municipal government, told a press conference.

Advertisers whose fraudulent ads cause "serious consequences" will be taken to court, while carriers of the ads will also be investigated, Jiao said, without elaborating on whether they would be punished.

The municipality also plans to publish the credit standing of advertisers, inspire the public to monitor the credibility of commercials and explore a market exit system for unqualified players to withdraw from the market, said Jiao.

Shanghai has intensified its efforts to combat misleading ads over the past year. In 2005, the ratio of fraudulent ads carried by the local media was 1.15 percent, a 2.7 percent drop year-on-year, the city's advertisement monitoring center said.

It said the city cracked down on 1,564 cases of advertising fraud last year, up 126 percent over 2004.

Source: Xinhua