China begins clampdown on video sites showing foreign TV series

China’s least favorite regulator, SAPPRFT, which oversees film, TV, and print media, today issued a notice that the country’s booming video streaming sites need to get licenses to stream overseas TV series.

Without a requisite license, a site would be forced to remove its content – bought legitimately from copyright holders – from the web. That would result in the effective banning of some foreign TV series in China, leaving viewers to go back to the old days of pirating their favorite shows.

Aside from Chinese serials, a number of dramas and comedies from the US, UK, and South Korea are particularly popular in China. The first season of the BBC’s Sherlock has been watched nearly nine million times on Tencent Video (HKG:0700), while both seasons of Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black have been viewed a total of 37 million times on Youku (NYSE:YOKU). New episodes of foreign serials go online less than 24 hours after their original overseas broadcast, replete with Chinese and English subtitles.

China’s heavily regulated and enormously dull state TV channels show none of the very newest Western series and only one or two of the hottest Korean ones. Korean dramas tend to be very light and uncontroversial romantic comedies. But state broadcaster CCTV is reportedly working on translating and screening The Big Bang Theory – a development that explained why that popular comedy was removed from the Chinese web in April.

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While not quite stated implicitly, SAPPRFT’s order might result in strict quotas for foreign TV shows in an attempt to reduce their influence over Chinese youngsters. That would mimic the nation’s quota on film imports, which is limited to just 34 per year. The TV show licenses might also prove to be a way to weed out violent or sexual content. China’s video sites must register for licenses before March 31, 2015, with the edict coming into effect the next day.

Up until now, China’s web streaming sites have been largely left alone apart from a few rough edits to some sex scenes. It seems that the clampdown starts now.

SAPPRFT’s statement today says the new edict is issued for the “development and prosperity of internet culture, to inherit and carry forward Chinese culture and traditions while actively absorbing the world’s outstanding cultural achievements.”