Chinese police are not known for a lax attitude to rule breaking when it comes to foreigners

Anecdotal experiences incoming:

I am moderately involved with various sinology students from Europe. And have traveled to China personally.

Personally I stayed at various AirBnBs within China and registered at the police in Bejing and Shanghai.

The host provided a signed letter confirming where we are staying. With that letter I headed to a local police station where I gave the letter and had to fill out a form with basic personal details and address of where I was staying.

In return I got a stamped letter confirming my stay.

Anecdotes from others: People who have registered late for various reasons (finding apartment, inconvenient arrival combined with work, etc)

I have as of yet not heard anything experience other than the police saying please register on time next time and still got their stamped confirmation of stay.

One standout story however is someone who looked up a recent political dissident via Baidu and got a visit from the police, nothing really exceptional happened except he got visited at his apartment got told off, had to sign a letter confirming the visit and infraction.

The person in question has been back to china multiple times since.

> someone who looked up a recent political dissident via Baidu and got a visit from the police

......How is anyone okay with this..

> had to sign a letter confirming the visit and infraction.

sorry, what infraction?

Looking up a political dissident. That's apparently illegal in China.

(It is a communist nation where disagreeing with the government is tantamount to treason and is treated as such.)

Chinese police are known to shy away from any work that falls away from what they are normally doing. Registering a foreigner in a small town is a once in a lifetime experience for them, so many things can go wrong, so they wont do it.