Fined Even With Real‑Name Authentication: Understanding Full‑Chain Traceability Requirements for Internet‑Activity Logs under Decree No.176

Effective October 1 2026, Measures for the Supervision and Inspection of Cyberspace Security by Public Security Organs (Decree No. 176 of the Ministry of Public Security) officially comes into force, repealing Decree No. 151. Many enterprise‑park operators had already deployed Wi‑Fi real‑name authentication under the old regulation and believed they were well‑prepared for compliance.

Inspection outcomes, however, often came as an unpleasant surprise.

During an audit at one industrial park, inspectors requested complete internet‑access evidence covering the preceding six‑month period. The enterprise could only retrieve real‑name registration records, but lacked logs documenting employees’ actual online behaviour and could not generate standard compliance reports. It was consequently ordered to rectify deficiencies within a set deadline.

What went wrong? Real‑name records existed, yet compliance still failed.

Decree No. 176 demands far more than isolated authentication entries. It requires a complete traceability chain, every link of which must withstand both remote technical detection and on‑site verification.

I. What Decree No. 176 Actually Requires: From “Having Records” to “Achievable Traceability”

Article 7 of Decree No. 176 lists eleven key inspection items. Item 3 — whether user‑registration and internet‑access logs are recorded and preserved in accordance with law — is the most frequently‑audited requirement.

“Record and preserve” carries stricter technical obligations than its literal wording suggests.

A hard baseline mandates internet‑access logs be retained for no less than six months. Retention duration alone is insufficient. Logs must comprehensively cover external‑web access, internal‑system visits, file exfiltration and cloud‑disk uploads. Mandatory fields include source IP address, authenticated account, timestamp, domain name and behavioural event.

II. Broken Traceability Chains: Why Enterprises Fail Even With Real‑Name Checks

A complete traceability workflow consists of four sequential links:

user real‑name authentication → obtain network access privileges → generate network logs → centrally store logs for query and traceability.

Ideally these links form a closed‑loop workflow. In real‑world deployments, architectural flaws frequently break this chain.

1. Separate appliances for authentication and logging
   This is the most‑common pitfall. One gateway handles Portal real‑name authentication, while a separate UTM device records access logs. The authentication database stores “which account logged‑in at what time”; the logging system stores “which IP visited which website”. No underlying data association links these two datasets.
2. Logs scattered across multiple hardware
   Some enterprises adopt multi‑tier networking, yet logs are dispersed across egress routers, authentication gateways and aggregation switches. Administrators must manually consolidate records from disparate devices. This workflow suffers incomplete fields and timestamp inconsistencies. Manually‑stitched log datasets rarely pass remote‑detection compliance validation.
3. Missing native binding between authenticated accounts and user behaviour
   Even when authentication and logging run on one physical appliance, separate modules may generate authentication logs and behaviour logs without shared indexing. This still produces two disconnected datasets. The correct implementation binds authenticated identities to every generated log entry at the moment a session is established, rather than performing post‑hoc data matching.

III. AINOPOL’s Solution: Native Co‑existence of Authentication and Logging on One Appliance

Instead of recommending add‑on log servers as after‑market patches, AINOPOL builds authentication and logging capabilities deep within network‑gateway architecture.

The core hardware is the M1 Dream Gateway. It consolidates routing, Portal real‑name authentication, log‑audit engine, IPS intrusion‑prevention, AV anti‑virus and WAF web‑protection functions. Authentication and logging modules are natively integrated at firmware level.

• Underlying session‑binding ties identities to every log entry
  Thanks to native session‑binding technology, each log record automatically carries the authenticated‑user identity upon session creation. No post‑processing data matching is required; binding takes place the moment network‑activity records are generated.
• Full‑volume persistent log storage
  Equipped with local hard‑disk storage, the M1 Dream Gateway maintains 180‑day cyclic retention for comprehensive logs. Fields include MAC address, IP, authenticated‑account information, login/log‑off timestamps and visited URLs. Logs are tamper‑resistant. Standard‑format compliance reports can be exported in one click, with Syslog / API interfaces supporting upload to public‑security monitoring platforms.
• 18 authentication modes eliminate anonymous‑access loopholes
  A total of eighteen authentication methods are supported: local accounts, WeChat, DingTalk and Feishu social‑login for employees and visitors. Even dumb terminals such as printers and time‑attendance machines are brought under audit coverage via MAC whitelisting to eliminate unmonitored traffic blind spots.
• Integrated communication‑security (Com‑Sec) design: compliance embedded, not retrofitted
  With AINOPOL’s integrated communication‑security philosophy, compliance capabilities are built‑into the all‑optical network foundation rather than added as external appliances post‑deployment. When enterprises roll‑out the all‑optical infrastructure, real‑name authentication, log retention and security defence are activated concurrently. This avoids secondary engineering work to implement logging and identity controls, cutting both hardware procurement and integration‑debugging overhead.

Decree No. 176 raises compliance requirements from merely “possessing real‑name records” toward a complete, verifiable traceability evidence chain. This transformation cannot be achieved simply by purchasing an extra log‑collection server; it demands re‑thinking architectural relationships between authentication and logging.

Separate hardware for authentication and logging remains commonplace in legacy deployments, where correlation depends on manual cross‑referencing. Under the new regulatory regime featuring advance‑notified remote detection and unannounced online patrols, manual ad‑hoc reconciliation is no longer viable.

AINOPOL addresses this at the architectural design phase: authentication and logging are natively coupled. Every internet‑activity entry inherently carries user‑identity attributes, and multi‑egress traffic logs converge onto a single appliance. This represents more than “having real‑name authentication”, it delivers the complete capability to prove who performed which online actions.

FAQ

Q: What log‑retention requirements are stipulated under Decree No. 176?
A: Internet‑access logs must be retained for a minimum of six months with adequate storage capacity and must not be overwritten prematurely. Logs shall cover external‑web browsing, internal‑system access, file exfiltration and cloud‑disk uploads. Mandatory fields include source IP, user account, timestamp, domain name and behavioural events.

Q: Why can enterprises still fail inspections even with real‑name authentication enabled?
A: Real‑name authentication answers “who accessed the network”, but not “what activities the user performed”. If authentication and logging run on disjoint systems with no underlying linkage, administrators have to manually correlate datasets, introducing inefficiency and errors. AINOPOL’s session‑binding associates user identities with logs upon session creation, delivering complete traceable chains on query.

Q: How does the M1 Dream Gateway link authenticated accounts to internet‑access behaviour?
A: Powered by underlying session‑binding technology, every log generated after successful authentication automatically inherits the corresponding user‑identity metadata without post‑hoc matching. Logs are stored locally in tamper‑proof format for 180 days, and standard compliance reports can be exported with one‑click operations.