Google goes Chinese but not without censorship

Google goes Chinese but not without censorship

The world's Number One in Internet Search, Google Inc. has launched its new search service in Chinese for the benefit of 110 million web-surfers in China. The new service, however, will strictly abide by the censorship of the communist regime in China. The company has been widely criticized for compromising its ethics in order to expand its business.

The Chinese government has disallowed Google to provide access to websites containing anti-establishment material. For instance, if a user were to search something related to 'democracy' or 'Free Tibet' on Google Chinese then the search engine would display a message that says “In line with local laws and policies, parts of the result are not listed.”

Google agrees that restricting the freedom of information was an ethical dilemma for the company. “While removing search results is inconsistent with Google's mission, providing no information . . . is more inconsistent with our mission,” said Andrew McLaughlin, Google's senior policy counsel in a statement.

It has been difficult for companies to resist the temptation of entering into the huge Chinese market. Other Internet giants like Microsoft and Yahoo are also known to have overlooked their company ethics in order to comply with regulations of the Chinese government.

Though Google has been largely condemned for its move but there have been some sympathetic reactions. “To their credit, Google does think very hard about these problems. [But] I think it was a mistake. . . . I think ultimately this will hurt Google,” said Timothy Wu Professor of Law at the University of Columbia. “We generally trust Google, which is why people use it. It needs to keep that [that public trust] in these two areas of censorship and privacy.”

Experts also believe that it is not a prerogative of companies to dispute the decisions of the government. “No company can stand up to government policy alone.” said California University journalism professor Xiao Qiang.