I am looking for the regs from China from an official chinese website that mentions this topic. My wife and I have researched all day. We asked the PSB office for the regs but they will not give us. They just told us to look in Baidu. The reason I ask for this is because so far this portion of the regs does not exist anywhere as of yet. I have seen plenty of other sources but nothing about this from PSB China.

ABOUT PROOF OF NO CRIMINAL RECORD IN THE US

I'm not sure about any new regulations or requirements for certification of no criminal record.

If you have a current job and visa I expect you are not required to provide a new criminal background certificate.

In the US there is no national record of criminal activity that can be readily provided to an individual.

If you are in China, the Embassy or Consulate will not provide this.

In the past one merely obtained a letter from their local city or town police agency which will state your criminal record in that specific location ONLY. In other words, if you committed a crime in one town, you simply provide evidence from another town and the local police will only check the records under their jurisdiction. Their letter will state clearly the area that their records pertain to.

The US, unlike China, does not provide a national criminal record and I imagine you would have very serious trouble providing more than the above.

I was only required to provide such a letter upon my initial job application several years ago and what I gave was a letter from the police from a small town. I don't have any criminal record anywhere but there is no easy way to provide that, especially if you are not in the US.

Lot of crap if you ask me...

My university told me there is no new requirement to append such a certificate. A call to Chengdu US Embassy resulted in a similar response.

Of course China can ask for anything they want to but that doesn't mean they will get what they ask for.

Criminal Records, continued..
A state will only provide criminal records for "state" crimes.

Local Counties provide reports for crimes in their jurisdiction. If an individual is charged for a local crime it might not show up in a state database and vice versa.

A federal crime or a local crime would not be included. Each agency only keeps records for the laws under it's jurisdiction. An FBI report should only cover Federal Crimes. I've never heard of anyone requesting or providing such a report. I imagine it would take a long time to get and not be easy to procure. Because each agency has limited records they should only provide reports for crimes under their jurisdiction.

UK Government advice was updated today to include:

Increasing incidents of teachers being arrested and detained for working on the wrong visas; research the institution and visa regulations properly before you leave the UK.

@Ocean: Is this China specific or about teachers in general? It would not surprise me if China was increasing visa enforcement.

@Geezer
China specific, but not Yunnan/KM specific.

Renewing my work residence permit now, and have a few updates, specifically on the CRIMINAL RECORD CHECK

First, @laoshi19 is wrong. FBI criminal record checks list all arrest incidents in which your fingerprints were provided to them by any law enforcement agency. That basically means every arrest, federal, state or local, and often does not bother to include whether the charges were dismissed.

Various states and localities differ on what they show in their reports. Some states show every arrest in their jurisdiction. Some only show convictions. It varies widely, including the regional scope of what turns up on the report.

Though I've been renewing the same work permit/residence permit for many years, the Labor Bureau requested a criminal record check last year, because, and I quote, "We want one on file for everyone." I was told I would only need this once.

They accepted a state criminal record check, translated and certified by a local (Kunming) translation agency. It was not certified or notarized by any US notary or Chinese embassy official.

Today, the lady at the office told us "Yeah, well I'm new here, and I didn't see it, so bring me your record check." My assistant is on her way now with last year's document. I will update about whether the state check is still accepted in its current form.

@Xiefei: Thanks for the updated info. Do they require a yearly health check? I am assuming you are doing this in Kunming.

@Geezer: Yes, Kunming (the rules seem to be different everywhere, but especially here)

I've been renewing the same work/residence permit for 5+ years now, and haven't been asked to provide a new health check for quite some time.

TX