The importance of electronic data evidence in criminal justice has become more and more prominent in the Internet era.There is a significant difference between the location of electronic data at the normative level and that at the level of trial practice.An analysis of written judgments on cases of online counterfeiting from 2005 to 2015 in the Lawyee Chinese Judgement indicates that,firstly,the definition of electronic data evidence in criminal trial practice is imprecise,secondly,authentication rules,including those on relevance review and legal examination,are only pursuing the truth as their main value,and thirdly,the widespread existence of electronic data appraisal has not played its expected role,and the application of expert assistance is still at its preliminary stage.Judicial practice shows that,in the future,the focus of court debate in criminal trial would shift from the authenticity of electronic data evidence to the relevancy and legitimacy of such evidence.Therefore,the improvement of the rules on the authentication of electronic data evidence is urgently needed.On the basis of understanding electronic data in a broad sense,we should strike a balance between the value of "pursuing the truth" and that of "pursuing the good",so as to construct electronic data authentication rules that meet the needs of the Internet era. |