China’s government-run online train ticket sales site 12306 has been causing problems since pretty much the moment it was launched. It broke during its first Spring Festival rush back in 2011, and since then has been the source of a litany of complaints: not processing refunds¹, cheating customers, promising² an app that didn’t materialize for years and then sucked when it finally showed up, breaking again, listing nonsensical departure/arrival times, being associated with corruption³, facilitating ticket scalping, shutting down third-party services that fix its bugs⁴, and more。

自从12306在线火车票订购网站的诞生后，这个由中国政府独立运营的系统似乎就在不停地出问题。2011年，在它第一次开始运营春运高峰时它就崩溃了，接下来它便成了一系列抱怨的根源：不处理退票，欺骗客户，承诺的app多年没有出现，一出现就糟糕透顶，反复瘫痪，显示无意义的出发抵达时间，贪污腐败，促进倒票行为，关闭帮助其修补漏洞的第三方服务，等等等等。

That’s an incredibly litany of crimes for a service that has only been around for three years, but its latest may be the worst yet: last week news broke that personal data from 140,000 users was leaked via a security flaw on the 12306 site. The leaked data includes personal ID numbers, email addresses, and phone numbers. It also contains unencrypted, plaintext passwords。

作为刚刚运营了3年的服务系统，它一连串的罪行是令人难以置信的，而最近新爆出的一条可能是最糟糕的：上周消息传出，由于12306网站的一个安全漏洞140000用户的个人信息被泄露。泄露信息包括个人身份证号码，电子邮箱地址还有电话号码。它还包含未加密的明文密码。

In a statement on its website after the leak, 12306 denies that the information comes from its database, saying that it doesn’t store plaintext passwords. Instead, the site suggests the ticket buyers’ data may have been leaked from one of the third-party plugins and programs Chinese people use to purchase tickets so that they don’t have to interact with the 12306 site directly. (Subsequent reports suggest hackers⁵ used leaked data from other sites to access 12306’s database)。

泄露丑闻发生后，12306在其网站上发声明，否认信息是来自于它的数据库，说它不存储明文密码。相反，该网站建议购票者的数据可能是被中国人用于购票的一个第三方插件和程序所泄露的，因此他们不必与12306进行直接交互。(后续报道显示黑客使用其它网站泄露的信息登录12306数据库)。

But it almost doesn’t matter whether the leaked data actually came from 12306 or a third-party plugin. The fact is that if 12306 was a reliable, fully⁶ functional⁷, and convenient platform for purchasing train tickets, nobody would use third-party apps to begin with. But because the site is so buggy and user-unfriendly, nearly half of China’s internet users buy their tickets via third-party services. (These services don’t sell tickets directly, they just facilitate purchases from 12306 by presenting a cleaner and more convenient user experience). Even if the leak came from a third-party plugin, it’s 12306’s fault that its crappy site has forced so many users onto those plugins in the first place。

但实际上数据是否是从12306泄露的还是从第三方插件已经无所谓了。事实是，如果12306是一个可靠的、功能齐全，方便购买火车票的平台，没有人会使用第三方应用程序。而正是因为这个网站如此卡又不好用，才使得近一半的中国的互联网用户通过第三方服务商购买车票。(这些服务商并不直接卖门票，他们只是为用户提供一个在12306购买车票时更便捷、更方便的用户体验)。即使泄漏来自第三方插件，12306蹩脚糟糕的网站已经迫使很多用户不得不在第一时间选择这些插件，这是12306的过错。

As an ecommerce platform, there’s simply no denying that 12306 is awful. But it would be so easy to fix! China has numerous internet companies with experience in building robust⁸ online shopping platforms that can withstand massive traffic. I have no doubt that a company like Alibaba or JD would be capable of building a more secure, more stable, and more convenient platform for train ticket sales, probably within a short time frame。

12306作为一个电子商务平台，它的糟糕是无可厚非的。修补它是非常简单的！中国有众多互联网公司，它们拥有健壮的网上购物平台构建经验，可以承受巨大的流量。我毫不怀疑，可能在短时间内，像阿里巴巴[微博]或京东这样的公司能够建设一个更安全、更稳定、更方便的火车票销售平台。

This is not the first time I’ve made this plea. And there were rumors⁹ that the site was looking for an ecommerce partner to help almost immediately after the site launched, though no partnership¹⁰ ever materialized. But it’s better late than never, and whether or not it directly leaked the buyers’ personal information last week, China’s government must recognize that it is culpable¹¹ here. Despite having cost nearly US$100 million, three years on 12306 still offers a user experience so terrible that nearly half its customers turn to third-party plugins and programs to complete their 12306 transactions。

这不是我第一次做这个请求。还有传言说这个网站在投放时就在寻找一个电子商务合作伙伴，以帮助网站立即启动，虽然从来没有落实这个伙伴关系。但它的迟到总比不到好，上周无论它是否直接泄露买家的个人信息，中国政府必须认识到，12306是有责任的。尽管投入成本近1亿美元，三年间，12306还是令其用户感到糟糕，致使近一半的客户转向第三方插件和程序来帮助完成他们在12306上的交易。

By any reasonable standard, 12306’s design is an abject¹² failure, and the site would have gone out of business long ago if it did not have a monopoly on sales of one of the most popular products in China. China’s government is unlikely to turn its ticket sales over to a private company any time soon, but it should at least hire Alibaba or JD to redesign its online platform from the ground up to create something that actually meets users’ needs, rather than driving them towards dubious¹³ third-party solutions as the current site does。

用任何公道的衡量标准，12306的设计失败都是可悲的，在中国，车票在线销售是最受欢迎的产品之一，如果12306不是凭借着拥有垄断销售的地位，它可能很早以前就无生意可做了。中国政府短时间内不大可能将车票销售私有化，但至少它可以雇佣像阿里巴巴或京东这样的团队去重新设计其在线平台，从而真正迎合用户需求，而不是像当下这样驱使12306用户投奔不可靠的第三方解决需求。