Uncle spent tens of thousands of yuan to buy a crystal ball for changing his luck, but unfortunately, some of his WeChat chat records have been deleted. Can they still be used as evidence? After dating for several years, my girlfriend remarried someone else and submitted thousands of pages of WeChat chat records to request a transfer of funds. How should I determine this? How should I interpret a reply from a former friend who paid 50000 yuan in legal fees and received an emoji? With WeChat becoming the most commonly used communication tool nowadays, more and more parties are submitting WeChat chat records as electronic evidence in court during litigation. The above situation is a real case heard by the Shanghai First Intermediate People's Court (hereinafter referred to as the Shanghai First Intermediate People's Court), which collectively reflects a core issue: how can WeChat chat records become evidence in court? Recently, a reporter from the Rule of Law Daily visited the Shanghai First Intermediate People's Court and conducted an exclusive interview with Gu Huiping, the assistant leader of the civil court team and a third level senior judge, to provide a detailed answer to this question. The evidence must comply with the "three natures". Mr. Xu has been unlucky recently, and the seller Li keeps boasting about the effectiveness of "transporting crystal balls" to him. Mr. Xu spent tens of thousands of yuan to buy and set up a feng shui bureau, but found that his luck has not improved. He filed a lawsuit against Li and attached screenshots of their WeChat chat records as evidence. The first instance did not support Mr. Xu's appeal, and both parties in the second instance submitted WeChat chat records from the same time period. After comparison, the judge found that both parties had deleted content from their chat records. Regarding this, Mr. Xu stated that he has a habit of deleting unimportant WeChat chat content due to the small memory of his phone. And the other party cannot provide a reasonable explanation. After careful comparison of the WeChat chat records submitted by both parties, it can be found that some of the content deleted by Mr. Xu is actually beneficial to himself, which proves that his explanation is reasonable. The WeChat chat records submitted by the other party that are unfavorable to oneself have no evidence to refute them, and their authenticity can be confirmed as valid evidence Gu Huiping said. According to the Decision of the Supreme People's Court on Amending Several Provisions on Evidence in Civil Litigation, WeChat chat records can also be used as evidence in litigation. WeChat chat records include various forms such as text, images, voice, video, network links, and transfer payment information, which can be used in court as evidence through electronic data. Electronic data has the inherent disadvantage of being easily tampered with and deleted, but as long as it has' authenticity, relevance, and legality ', it can still be used as the basis for making a decision Gu Huiping said that in practice, judges need to strictly examine the authenticity of WeChat chat records to ensure that they are logically related to the facts to be investigated in the case, and that the parties provide them in accordance with legal procedures, without infringing on the privacy and other legitimate rights and interests of others. Shortly after Mr. Liu broke up with his ex girlfriend whom he had been in love with for several years, he learned that she was going to marry someone else. He angrily sued her and printed thousands of pages of WeChat chat records during their relationship as evidence of "financial fraud" and submitted them to the court. In practice, many litigation participants simply take screenshots of WeChat chat windows based on intuition and submit them directly. However, judges find it difficult to obtain accurate and effective information from thousands of pages of chat records, let alone verify it Gu Huiping said. There are many similar issues of disorderly submission. Some parties claimed in the first instance that their WeChat chat records had been deleted, but in the second instance, they stated that they had found someone to restore them through technical means; Another party insists that the name displayed on the chat window is the other party's name, but omits the identification documents of both parties in the chat. Regarding this, Gu Huiping wrote an article titled "How to Submit WeChat Chat Records: What the Judge Said", which was widely reprinted and recognized after being published in the "Court Session" column of the official WeChat account of Shanghai No.1 Intermediate People's Court. The article established unified operating rules for the submission of WeChat chat records from five aspects: screenshot printing, screen recording submission, on-site demonstration, identity verification, and valid cross examination. For example, for screenshots and printed copies of thousands of chat records, it is recommended that the parties involved ensure that they meet the "three characteristics" of evidence, while also ensuring clear handwriting, complete elements, and orderly arrangement. The page numbers should be compiled and key pages should be extracted before submission. For example, during on-site demonstrations, when encountering the situation of recovering data, sufficient evidence needs to be provided to support it, otherwise the WeChat chat record is questionable evidence; When presenting evidence, it is necessary to first prove one's own identity and the identity of the other party; When cross examining, it is recommended that the other party submit WeChat chat records from the same period for key content and conduct careful verification. Mr. Yan helped his friend pay a lawyer fee of 50000 yuan by clearing the fog and restoring the facts. He sent a photo of the lawyer fee to the other party on WeChat, and the other party replied with an OK gesture emoji without further statement. After the breakdown of their relationship, Mr. Yan sued the other party and provided a screenshot of the chat record as evidence, requesting the return of the advance payment. Although emojis may not be as intuitive as text in expressing the thoughts of the parties involved, their essence is a type of image and also falls under the category of electronic data Gu Huiping said that the determination of such chat records should be based on daily communication habits and chat contexts, and should comply with the general public's cognitive and behavioral principles. The emoticons in this case are sufficient to determine that the other party is aware of Mr. Yan's payment for them. In fact, unclear intentions are often encountered in WeChat chat records, and how to accurately explore the true meaning of the parties involved is something that judges need to carefully discern. Regarding this, Gu Huiping explained that judges can infer the true meaning of the dialogue by taking into account its context; The interpretation of the use of emoticons by the parties involved should conform to common understanding; Use WeChat chat records as one of the evidence and combine it with other evidence to determine the facts. It is quite difficult to achieve consistency between legal facts and objective facts. Judges can only make full use of experience and rules to review evidence, eliminate falsehood and preserve truth, and try to clear the fog and restore objective facts as much as possible, so that the people can feel fairness and justice in every judicial case Gu Huiping said. (New Society)