Google Shuts China Site, because “self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement” by China

Radio Free Asia,  2010-03-22 –

HONG KONG— Google is redirecting China-based traffic to its uncensored Hong Kong Web site, according to a message posted on the company’s official blog, two months the Internet giant threatened to leave the country because of censorship and Chinese hacker attacks.

Google had been negotiating with Beijing about the right to continue hosting a search service in China without filtering results according to Chinese law.

“Earlier today we stopped censoring our search services” for China’s 400 million Internet users, the company blog said.

“Users visiting Google.cn are now being redirected to Google.com.hk, where we are offering uncensored search in simplified Chinese, specifically designed for users in mainland China and delivered via our servers in Hong Kong,” chief legal officer David Drummond wrote.

China requires Internet service providers to censor words and images that the ruling Communist Party says are illegal or unacceptable.

Google said it plans to maintain its engineering and sales offices in China to keep a technological foothold there and continue to sell ads for the Chinese-language version of its search engine in the United States.

The Google blog entry said the Chinese government had been “crystal clear throughout our discussions that self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement” for continuing its business in China.

“We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services,” Drummond wrote, adding that the company would continue monitoring accessibility in China and posting the results daily.

The decision comes after more than two months of negotiations after Google announced that it, along with more than 20 other companies, had been the victim of cyberattacks originating from China.

Google said its ensuing investigation into the attacks uncovered evidence that the Gmail accounts of “dozens” of human rights activists connected with China were being accessed by third parties through phishing scams and malware installed on their computers.

It said the attacks and surveillance that the investigation uncovered—combined with government efforts to further limit free speech on the Internet through the blocking of Web sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube—led the company to conclude that “we could no longer continue censoring our results on Google.cn.”…… (more details from Radio Free Asia)

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– Google stops censoring in China- redirects traffic to uncensored Hong Kong Web site