China Net censors named
p2pnet.net News:- Google,Yahoo and Microsoft have again been specifically named for actively working with China to police the Net.
This time, to the, “dismay of human rights organisations,” the three are among western firms which have, “recently adapted their products in order to gain access to the Chinese market, by developing technology which censors their web-browsers in accordance with government diktat,” says Committee on Foreign Affairs Seventh Report.
Under Human Rights, Freedom of Expression: the Internet, it states:
The restriction of the internet in China has emerged as a key infringement of the right of freedom of expression. Numbers of internet users in China have been estimated at between 110 and 200 million. However, the system for filtering, censoring and controlling the internet has been described as “the most sophisticated effort of its kind in the world”. Government regulations prohibit the use of the internet for a variety of activities, which include “harming the honor or the interests of the nation”, “disrupting national policies on religion, propagating evil cults and feudal superstitions” and “inciting illegal assemblies, associations, marches, demonstrations, or gatherings that disturb social order”.
In a new development, and to the dismay of human rights organisations, several Western internet companies have recently adapted their products in order to gain access to the Chinese market, by developing technology which censors their web-browsers in accordance with government diktat. Particular criticism has been aimed at Microsoft, which last year launched a portal in China that blocks use of words such as ‘freedom’ in the text of weblogs (’blogs’); Yahoo!, for identifying journalist Shi Tao at the request of the Chinese authorities, leading to his arrest and sentencing for posting on the internet an internal Communist Party minute; and Google, for launching a self-censoring version of its website in China. Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft submitted evidence to our inquiry. The argument they put forward, in various ways, was that the choice faced by foreign companies in China was either to comply with domestic legislation, or to leave the country, and that remaining in the country has the beneficial effect of offering Chinese internet users increased access to information and internet services. However, in June, Sergey Brin, one of Google’s founders, admitted that Google’s actions had compromised its principles.
Human Rights Watch raised the possibility of other countries with repressive regimes observing China’s successful manipulation of Western companies and following suit, stating that “China is already exporting technology for monitoring the Internet to other repressive governments, Zimbabwe, for example”. The companies which submitted evidence to us advised that China was not the only country in which their product was modified according to the requests of government, but did not give specific details of the nature of such regulation.
We conclude that the collaboration of Western internet companies in the censorship and policing of the internet for political purposes is morally unacceptable. We further conclude, however, that it is in the interests of Chinese internet users that as much information be available for browsing as possible. We recommend that the Government put pressure on the Chinese government to relax its censorship of the internet and its requirement for foreign companies to restrict the political content of their pages. We further recommend that the Government represent to the Chinese authorities the damage which is done to economic growth by continued restriction of the free flow of information. [Report's emphasis.]
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August 16th, 2006 at 12:06 am
the ones that are going to censor the whole internet. If you use them, you are being censored while you are using them. At very least you are being spied on and every page you visit, write, etc is being cached by these entities for any government to use any way they want to. Welcome to the the New World Order; like it or not.