Google vs. China - An Excerpt

Google vs. China
Excerpt from Washington Post Editorial

GOOD FOR Google. The company's decision to stop censoring its Chinese search engine is more likely to mean the end of its China-based service than a breakdown of Beijing's political firewall. But more important than the question of whether Google.cn survives is the larger issue that Google has now raised for other Western companies and democratic governments -- which is whether China's gross and growing abuse of the Internet should be quietly tolerated or actively resisted.

Google cited a major instance of that abuse in announcing its policy change: "a highly sophisticated and targeted attack" on Google and more than 20 other large companies aimed at stealing software code. "A primary goal of the attackers," Google said, was breaking into the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.

This is shocking but unsurprising. Cyber-attacks from China aimed at U.S. businesses, the Pentagon and other government agencies have become commonplace, if not epidemic, in recent years. So have Beijing's demands that Western companies collaborate in its efforts to censor political content on the Internet and snoop on the private e-mails of its citizens, several of whom have been prosecuted with e-mails supplied by Yahoo. China aims not just at eliminating the free speech and virtual free assembly inherent to the Internet but at turning it into a weapon that can be used against democrats and democratic societies.

Until now, Western companies and governments have mostly gone along with Beijing's policies -- though U.S. computer manufacturers successfully resisted an attempt by China last year to require that censoring software be pre-installed on all new computers. Now Google has taken the admirable step of embracing open and public resistance. Skeptics point out that it was losing the search-market battle inside China to the domestic brand Baidu. But Google.cn still attracts tens of millions of Chinese users, who will have questions for their government if the company is driven out. U.S consumers, for their part, should want answers from companies such as Apple and Microsoft, which continue to kowtow to the Chinese censors. Internet activists say Microsoft censors Chinese language searches of Bing both in and outside of China; Apple has blocked Chinese from downloading applications related to the Dalai Lama.
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Google's action also challenges the Obama administration, which has been slow to embrace the cause of Internet freedom. The restrictions the Chinese government imposes on Google and other firms ought to be a trade issue as well as a human rights issue; after all Beijing is making it impossible for Western companies to compete in an important part of its market. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton issued a statement Tuesday saying the Chinese government would be asked about the cyber-attacks reported by Google. But another question ought to be directed at her own department, which has sat on funding for Internet-freedom initiatives and denied support to the Global Internet Freedom Consortium, which says its software can circumvent China's firewall. Firewall-busting would allow the Chinese to continue accessing Google's uncensored searches whether or not the company retains a Chinese base. It ought to be a major part of the Internet initiative Ms. Clinton plans to announce this month.
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Google China staff 'investigated'
Google has said it will no longer follow Chinese censorship laws following the cyber attack [AFP]

Google is reportedly investigating whether any of its staff in China were involved in a cyber attack against the company.

According to unnamed sources cited by the Wall Street Journal some members of the search giant's 700 China staff have had their company internal network access cut while the investigation takes place.

The report came as China for the first time spelled out that Google was expected to adhere Chinese laws on the internet.

"Foreign enterprises in China need to adhere to China's laws and regulations, respect the interests of the general public and cultural traditions and shoulder corresponding responsibilities. Google is no exception," Ma Zhaoxu, a spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry, told reporters on Tuesday.

The comments are the first time a Chinese official has mentioned Google by name since the company's surprise announcement last week that it was reconsidering the future of its business in China following what it said was a "sophisticated attack" by hackers.

The company is to meet Chinese officials after saying that it would no longer follow Chinese internet censorship laws and warning that it may have to pull out of China altogether.

It was not immediately clear if Google had found evidence to link any of its staff to either the theft of its intellectual property or alleged attempts to access Gmail accounts of Chinese dissidents.

'Business as usual'

On Monday, Google said it was "business as usual" in China and its employees were at work, after local media reports that some staff had had their access to Google's global network cut off and could no longer work.

The company had previously said it is no longer willing to bow to Chinese internet censors by filtering search results on google.cn, but was seeking talks with the government on a solution.

Senior US government officials have said they are pressing Beijing for an explanation over the dispute.

China says the row will not affect Sino-US ties, but has also insisted that Google and other foreign Internet firms must obey its laws.

The Foreign Correspondents' Club of China said on Monday that expatriate journalists in a "few" bureaus in the capital had discovered that their Gmail accounts had been hacked, with messages forwarded to a stranger's account.