Vietnam's Competition and Consumer Authority (VCC) has moved beyond guidance and into enforcement. In early June 2026, the regulator issued sanctions against enterprises for failing to disclose commercial relationships with Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) and Key Opinion Consumers (KOCs) promoting products on TikTok, YouTube, and other social platforms. The actions mark the first enforcement wave under the amended Advertising Law (Law 75/2025/QH15), which took effect on January 1, 2026, layered atop the 2023 Law on Protection of Consumer Rights whose Article 10.1.h has prohibited undisclosed sponsorships since July 2024.
The regulatory framing here matters. Article 10.1.h targets the business — not the influencer — as the primary responsible party when a sponsorship arrangement goes undisclosed. The enterprise that engaged the KOL is the entity in VCC's crosshairs. This is a deliberate architectural choice, and it shifts compliance incentives in ways that deserve serious attention from any brand operating in Vietnam's booming creator economy.
Why Disclosure Rules Deserve a Fair Hearing
Before critiquing the approach, the case for strong disclosure standards is worth stating plainly. Vietnam's influencer marketing sector is large and consumer trust in creators is unusually high: 77 percent of Vietnamese online consumers report having purchased a product based on a KOL recommendation, according to the AsiaKOL 2024 Vietnam Influencer Marketing Guide. With over 72 million social media users and TikTok's advertising-eligible audience reaching 76 million in late 2025, undisclosed commercial endorsements carry genuine potential for consumer deception at scale.
The 2025 Kera Gummy case illustrated what happens when the guardrails are absent. Several prominent Vietnamese influencers — including Miss Grand International winner Nguyễn Thúc Thùy Tiên — promoted fiber supplement products without credible scientific backing or regulatory approval. Over 135,000 packs were sold, generating roughly 20.3 billion VND in revenue. The case resulted in criminal convictions under Article 198 of the Penal Code for deceiving customers, with two-year prison sentences. The scale of consumer harm in that instance provides the strongest rationale for the rules now being enforced.
The Architecture of Vietnam's Two-Track System
Vietnam has not settled for a single law. It has built a two-layer system in which the Consumer Protection Law and the Advertising Law impose overlapping but distinct obligations.
Under the 2023 Consumer Protection Law (Law 19/2023/QH15), Article 10.1.h classifies undisclosed sponsorship as a prohibited act. The law makes the sponsoring enterprise responsible for ensuring that any commercial relationship with an influencer is disclosed to the audience. The 2024 implementing Decree 55/2024/ND-CP adds operational details.
The amended Advertising Law (Law 75/2025/QH15, passed June 16, 2025, in force January 1, 2026) then imposes a parallel set of obligations directly on the content creator as an "advertising conveyor." Under Article 15a, influencers must:
- Verify the advertiser's credibility and review product documentation before accepting any engagement
- Decline to promote products they have not personally used or do not adequately understand
- Give clear notice — using identifiers such as #ads or "sponsored" — both immediately before and throughout the promotional content
- Comply with consumer protection law when describing product attributes
- Register and pay taxes on all advertising income
From January 1, 2026, organizations found guilty of advertising violations also face potential criminal liability — not just administrative fines — marking a significant shift from purely civil enforcement.
Proportionality and the Calibration Problem
Here the analysis becomes more complicated. Administrative fines under the existing Decree 98/2020/ND-CP framework range from 40 to 60 million VND (roughly $1,600–$2,400) for businesses that fail to disclose influencer sponsorships, and 60 to 80 million VND for misleading advertising. For small enterprises running micro-KOL campaigns, these sums are meaningful. For mid-size or large consumer brands, they are negligible — low enough that enforcement could easily be priced in as a cost of doing business rather than a genuine deterrent.
This creates a perverse calibration: fines that are too low for large brands but potentially severe for small creators or SMEs who lack compliance infrastructure. January 2026 also saw TikTok Pte. Ltd. fined VND 880 million (approximately $36,000) by Vietnam's National Competition Commission for data consent failures and consumer protection violations — an order of magnitude larger than the individual sponsorship-disclosure fine ceiling. That discrepancy illustrates the gap between platform-level enforcement and enterprise-level penalties.
The criminal liability provision compounds the proportionality concern. An organization that repeatedly fails to include a #sponsored tag now theoretically faces criminal exposure alongside administrative fines. Criminal prosecution is described by Vietnamese officials as a "painful last resort," but its presence on the statute book creates legal uncertainty that could disproportionately chill legitimate influencer marketing by brands that lack sophisticated legal teams.
What Brands Operating in Vietnam Need to Do Now
The VCC's June 2026 enforcement actions confirm that the grace period for adapting to the new framework is over. The regulator has been explicit that it is prioritizing consumer data practices, influencer disclosure failures, and prohibited contract terms under the 2023 Consumer Protection Law.
For brands, the immediate implications are practical:
- Sponsorship agreements with KOLs and KOCs should now specify disclosure obligations as a contractual term, with the brand retaining the right to review and pre-approve content labels
- Legal review of standard influencer briefs is essential — if the brief does not require #ads or "sponsored" labeling, the brand is the party at regulatory risk under Article 10.1.h
- The verification obligation on KOLs (who must review product certifications, especially for health, cosmetics, and functional food categories) requires brands to prepare documentation packages, not just brand scripts
Vietnam's dual-track approach is more architecturally sophisticated than single-statute systems, and the underlying consumer protection rationale is sound. The implementation gap — between low administrative fines and the nuclear option of criminal liability — is where the framework most needs refinement. A tiered civil penalty structure, with fines that scale to turnover rather than fixed VND ceilings, would better serve the goal of deterrence without the chilling effect of criminal exposure for disclosure omissions.