Compiled from: Beijing Market Regulation Bureau
 
On May 24, Apple Electronics Trading (Beijing) Co., Ltd. was fined 200,000 yuan by the Dongcheng District Market Regulation Bureau of Beijing for publishing false advertisements.

 
Case review
On February 14, 2022, law enforcement officers, based on a tip-off, browsed the aforementioned website and found that the company had published advertisements for its MacBook Air products on the site. The advertisements used phrases such as "The 8-core CPU delivers smooth performance with great power efficiency" and "The M1 chip has the fastest CPU we have ever built," with the word "" displayed in the upper right corner of the page.

Investigation revealed that the page was a commercial advertisement for the MacBook Air notebook sold by the company. The MacBook Air is equipped with an M1 chip featuring an 8-core CPU, including four high-performance cores and four high-efficiency cores. In October 2021, Apple launched the MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and M1 Max chips. These chips feature a new 10-core CPU composed of eight high-performance cores and two high-efficiency cores, offering up to 70% faster performance than the M1.

In summary, at the time of the incident, the CPU in the M1 chip was not the fastest Apple had ever built. While simultaneously selling the MacBook Air with the M1 chip and the MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and M1 Max chips, the company claimed in its MacBook Air advertisement that the M1 chip "has the fastest CPU we have ever built," which was inconsistent with the facts. The advertisement was created, edited, and uploaded by the company itself, and the advertising costs could not be calculated.

In accordance with Article 55, Paragraph 1 of the Advertising Law of the People's Republic of China (2018), the Dongcheng District Market Supervision Administration of Beijing ordered the party to correct the above illegal acts, cease publishing the above advertisements, eliminate the impact within the corresponding scope, and impose a fine of 200,000 yuan.
 
 
"Advertising Law of the People's Republic of China"
Article 55
Whoever, in violation of the provisions of this Law, publishes false advertisements shall be ordered by the market supervision and administration department to cease publishing the advertisements, ordered the advertiser to eliminate the impact within the corresponding scope, and be fined not less than three times but not more than five times the advertising expenses; if the advertising expenses cannot be calculated or are obviously low, a fine of not less than 200,000 yuan but not more than 1,000,000 yuan shall be imposed; if there are more than three illegal acts within two years or other serious circumstances, a fine of not less than five times but not more than ten times the advertising expenses shall be imposed, and if the advertising expenses cannot be calculated or are obviously low, a fine of not less than 1,000,000 yuan but not more than 2,000,000 yuan shall be imposed, and the business license may be revoked, and the advertising review authority shall revoke the advertising review approval document and not accept its advertising review application for one year.
 
 
[1] The author's perspective
In recent years, amendments to the Advertising Law have gradually heightened public vigilance over advertising language, and the use of extreme terms such as "best" and "first" has been decreasing. As a major international corporation, Apple Inc. should be very cautious in this regard, but this time, perhaps out of great confidence in its products, it overlooked relevant laws and regulations.
 
The author suggests that although prominent features are selling points of products, terms like "best" and "first" are indeed too extreme, so their overuse should be avoided in promotions; otherwise, once verified, the company will face administrative penalties.