context: The State Council's 2026 legislative work plan called for accelerated progress on legislation for the healthy development of AI, alongside legislation covering common elements—data, computing power, algorithms, intellectual property, cybersecurity and supply chain security—and key application scenarios. On the industrial security track, the document arrived just over two weeks after the Office of the Foreign Investment Security Review Working Mechanism blocked a foreign acquisition of general-purpose AI agent firm Manus and ordered the parties to unwind the transaction, signalling Beijing now treats AI agents as a strategically sensitive industrial domain.
The Cyberspace Administration of China, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology jointly issued ‘Implementation opinions on standardising application and innovative development of AI agents’. Caixin analyses the policy and argues it is a supporting document to State Council's August 2025 'Opinions on deepening rollout of AI+ initiative', advancing the phase target of over 70 percent application penetration for new-generation intelligent terminals and AI agents by 2027
Caixin reports the document highlights
- AI agent defined as intelligent system with autonomous perception, memory, decision-making, interaction and execution capabilities
- guiding principles: safety and controllability, regulated order, innovation-driven, application-led
- technical foundation and standards
- improving general foundation model performance; developing sector-specific specialised models
- establishing standards framework; accelerating national and industry standards including AI AIP (agent interconnection protocol)
- mandatory standards supported in healthcare, transport, media, public security
- smart internet architecture and AI agent registration platform under exploration; IPv6 leveraged for end-to-end communication
- security and oversight
- AI agents barred from exploiting data dominance or anthropomorphic techniques to propagate harmful values or carry out algorithmic exploitation
- safeguards against addiction and emotional dependence among minors and elderly
- three decision-making tiers: user-only, user-authorised, agent-autonomous
- users retain right to know and final decision authority; agent operations must not exceed authorisation
- industry self-regulation and credit evaluation encouraged; disciplinary action against technology abuse, deceptive inducement, false advertising and concealment of defects
- typical application scenarios
- 19 scenarios listed, spanning scientific research, smart manufacturing, energy and resources, transport, agriculture, finance, terminal applications, culture and tourism, commercial services, education, healthcare
Wang Xinrui 王新锐 Shihui Partners says
- document positioning
- supporting document to August 2025 AI + initiative
- 2026 release as intermediate year to push the 70 percent target forward
- aimed at governments, public institutions, SOEs and major platform companies: gives them rules for pilots, testing, rollout and infrastructure building
- state-led technical foundation work
- central coordination reduces duplicated effort and 'low-level involution' between firms
- standards and foundation sections contain concrete executable content: data interfaces, trusted interconnection, quality evaluation
- baseline capabilities and underlying rules can be aligned across AI firms first
- dual signalling on industrial application
- highlights AI agent areas with positive socioeconomic value (e.g. scientific research)
- issues warning on sensitive areas: 'AI agents using data dominance and anthropomorphic techniques to propagate harmful values or carry out algorithmic exploitation'
- legislative tempo
- AI product forms evolving rapidly; 'small-incision' legislation can address typical risks
- policy documents and subsequent legislation will consolidate common legal issues, providing stability for the industry