Google to escape great firewall of China

Wednesday 13th January 2010

Google has said it will no longer submit to Chinese government censorship of its search results after revealing human rights activists' Gmail accounts had fallen victim to an attempted hack.

Although the search engine giant did not explicitly blame Beijing for the "highly sophisticated and targeted attack" upon its corporate infrastructure in China, it says it is prepared to pull out of the Chinese market altogether.

In a blog post published last night, Google, which its own intellectual property and that belonging to 20 other large companies had been stolen, said the "primary goal" of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of two Chinese human rights activists.

The failed attack also saw dozens of other Gmail users based in the US, China and Europe who are advocates of human rights have their accounts accessed.

Google insisted only account information and not emails themselves had been accessed.

David Drummond, Google's chief legal officer, said the search engine giant, which has a corporate motto of "Don't be evil", had taken the unusual step of disclosing the attacks because the information went to the "heart of a much bigger global debate about freedom of speech".

Google agreed to self-censorship at the Chinese government's request when it launched Google.cn in January 2006, arguing that the benefits of increased access to information outweighed its "discomfort" in agreeing to censor some results, including details and pictures of the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

But that belief was no longer tenable, Mr Drummond wrote.

"These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered - combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web - have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China," he said.

"We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognise that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China."

During a visit to China during an Asia tour last year, Barack Obama raised the issue of internet censorship, and his secretary of state Hillary Clinton said Google's allegations raised "very serious concerns and questions".

"We look to the Chinese government for an explanation," she said.

"The ability to operate with confidence in cyberspace is critical in a modern society and economy.

"I will be giving an address next week on the centrality of internet freedom in the 21st century, and we will have further comment on this matter as the facts become clear."

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