By MLex Staff ( November 7, 2025, 06:52 GMT | Insight) -- Prosecutors in Shanghai have used Big-Data models to identify anticompetitive procurement practices by health-sector institutions, echoing recent moves by enforcement authorities to integrate AI tools. The trend aligns with Beijing’s broader strategy of using digital tools to modernize governance under the unified national market framework. The Shanghai case was one of several disclosed Thursday by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, highlighting how prosecutorial agencies are turning to algorithmic screening to detect broader public-interest risks, including in sectors such as healthcare, taxation and environmental protection.Prosecutors in Shanghai have used Big-Data models to identify anticompetitive procurement practices by health-sector institutions, echoing recent moves by enforcement authorities to integrate AI tools. The case was one of several disclosed Thursday by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, highlighting how prosecutorial agencies are turning to algorithmic screening to detect broader public-interest risks, including in sectors such as healthcare, taxation and environmental protection. In the Shanghai case, the city's procuratorate used a data supervision model to review more than 1,000 public procurement announcements issued by district health commissions and affiliated institutions. The model applied a three-step filter that cross-matched the issuer’s administrative status, the fiscal nature of project funding, and the presence of language potentially excluding or disadvantaging out-of-area bidders. After filtering out tenders that didn’t involve fiscal funds or came from non-government bodies, prosecutors identified 33 leads. Further investigation revealed 53 projects — many involving services such as skills training and IT operations — that had imposed unreasonable restrictions, including city-based bidding qualifications and geographically weighted scoring. These practices violated China’s fair-competition principles and involved public spending of about 19.3 million yuan ($2.7million). The Shanghai procuratorate opened a formal case in December 2024. Prosecutors consulted with local health and market supervision departments, then issued formal suggestions urging the removal of discriminatory conditions. They also pressed authorities to strengthen sector-wide administrative oversight and ensure follow-through on corrective actions. Authorities subsequently issued supplemental announcements for ongoing tenders and re-tendered already contracted projects through competitive procedures after terminating those with exclusionary terms. The case illustrates prosecutors’ growing role in fair-competition enforcement. By developing and applying Big-Data models to public procurement data, they identified risk patterns, collected supporting evidence and facilitated systemic corrections. Their intervention reinforced fair competition and contributed to broader efforts to build a unified national market. Other cases published in the same batch showed similar uses of data tools in non-competition contexts....
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