Google Inc. will stop censoring its search results in China and may pull out of the country completely after discovering that computer hackers had tricked human-rights activists into exposing their email accounts to outsiders.
The change of heart announced Tuesday heralds a major shift for the Internet's search leader, which has repeatedly said it will obey Chinese laws requiring some politically and socially sensitive issues to be blocked from search results available in other countries. The acquiescence had outraged free-speech advocates and even some shareholders, who argued Google's co-operation with China violated the company's "don't be evil" motto.
The criticism had started to sway Google co-founder Sergey Brin, who openly expressed his misgivings about the company's presence in China, but the tipping point didn't come until Google recently uncovered hacking attacks launched from within China. The apparent goal: gathering information about dozens of human rights activists trying to shine a light on the country's censorship and other secretive policies.
Google officials said they plan to talk to the Chinese government to determine if there is a way the company can still provide unfiltered search results in the country. If an agreement can't be worked out, Google is prepared to leave China four years after creating a search engine bearing China's web suffix, ".cn" to put itself in a better position to profit from the world's most populous country.
No comments:
Post a Comment