Topic on China, Google and the control of the Internet

I) The story between Google and China

As every war stories, the struggle between China and Google started with an attack made by one of the two sides. But in the era of 2010, the attack was not made with a punch, a gunshot or an insult : it was a cyber attack. Indeed, on 12 January, Google announced hackers have trieds to infiltrate its software coding and the e-mail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.
David Drummond, the chief legal officer of the company, said the operation was « targeted » and « highly sophisticated » . The goals of the attack were to stole proprietary computer code and also access the Gmail account of serveral Human Rights activists. Obviously, two accounts of the online mail service Gmail have been accessed . But the hackers had partly failed because they only accessed account information (such as the date the account was created and subject line), and not the e-mail content. Similar intrusions have been also lauched on about 20 other big companies including the fields of the Internet, Media, Chemistry, Technologies and Finance. And last but not the least, they discovered that the Gmail accounts of dozens of defenders of human rights in China have been "routinely accessed by third parties".
Therefore, Google realized that it could not fully assure the confidentiality and safety of its Gmail users. Even if this intrusion have not been accessed through any security breach at Google but "most likely via phishing scams or malware placed on users' computers", the giant of the Internet felt offended and threatened.
Google decided to carry out an investigation but it was quite obvious that China was involved in the attack. Indeed, the main victims of the Gmail intrusions were advocates of human rights in China and we know Beijing is willing to do anything in order to suppress its political opponents. Even if Google did not accused China directly, the company announced at this time that it is no longer willing to censor searches in China. Thus, the war was blatantly declared.
Then, negociations and declarations came. Google wanted to discuss with China's government on the legal existence of a search engine which is not censored. If this request was not possible it would pull out of China. The government have discussed with the company on 29 January and 25 February. During these talks, Beijing said to Google that its development in China was still possible if he respects Chinese law but if the company wanted to quit China, it was another problem. On their side, the leaders of Google said that there was no negociation because from the begining of the talks Beijing has claimed auto-censorship was non-negociable. In addition to that, the results of the investigation on the January attacks confirmed China's authorities were involved.
After two months of confusing negociations, the leaders of Google officially announced on 22 March that it pull out of China. All the searches in China will be re-routed to Google 's Hong Kong-based site. Therefore Google.cn does not exist anymore, it is replaced by Google.com.hk, the uncensored search engine. David Drummond stated this re-routing was "entirely legal and will meaningfully increase access to information for people in China".
This decision leads to several consequences. Firstly, Google workers in China are threatened. However, Google said it would maintain an R&D and sales presence in China. The size of its sales team would depend on how many Chinese people can get at the Hong Kong-based site. Anyway, the change is not very important since only 2 percent of Google's workforce is located in China. Secondly, because of the re-routing, there might be some service slowdowns and delays in getting search results. Lastly, despite that the searches are not auto-censored by Google, the Chinese authorities will censor themselves search results. That means there is not much change for the Chinese people. When they will search «square Tiananmen », instead of having a nice picture of the square they will have a message of error, but not the pictures of the Tiananmen events of 1989.
After this brief summary of the facts, an analysis of the two sides is important to come to a better understanding of this conflict.

II) Analysis

Google's side

The decision made by Google to stop censorsing its search engine in China is a complete twist. Formerly, Google had swallowed many bitter pills to enter the huge Chinese market. First, in 2006 China-based google.cn search page was created with censored results. At that time Google made a speech to the US congress explaining that an autocensorship search engine was better for the Chinese people than no search engine at all. Thus, it agree for example to replace the picture of the tankman by nice tourist pictures of square Tiananmen. Later, he also said nothing when the Chinese authorities accused the compagny to host pornographic content and accepted without batting an eyelid to remove it and clean again its search engine. He also continued to auto-censor its search engine when China blocked access to Google's YouTube site in the spring 2009.

So why such a twist?

David Drummond, Google’s chief legal counsel, talked to The Atlantic about the decision of the compagny. He explained the connection between the hacking attempt and the decision to stop censoring results. The hacking incident was not a simple way for some hackers to violate property intellectual and make money or to simply damage the compagny. According to him, this particular attack, lead by China was completly different since the main goal was political: to get information from the human right activists account. Thus, Google realised he was part of an overall repressive system and can not stand it anymore. Furthermore, since the Olympic games, the pressure put on Google by the Chinese government in terms of censorship increased. He said it became more and more difficult to operate in China. « We thought when we went in that we could help to open the country and things could get better by our being there. Things seemed to be getting worse ». Then, he explained why the compagny decided to wait so long after the hack attack to shut down its China-based search site. He said the compagny have tried to negociate with the Chinese authorities on how they could keep orperating in China. As they faced a deadlock, Google leaders finally came to the hard conclusion that they disagree with Chinese law because it is against their principles and since they do not want to violate the law the only solution is to leave.
According to some people, Google has found an honorable way to leave the difficult market of China. Even if Google is the leader of the search engines all other the world, in China he is only the second. Indeed, it is far away from the domestic competitor, Baidu.com, wich hold 63,6 % of the market. China only accounts for 1 percent to 2 percent of Google’s revenue. Like other foreign Internet companies, Google has had trouble growing in China. However, it is not so sure that Google is leaving China for commercial reasons: China is the biggest telecom market in the world, with 370 millions of internet users and 650 millions of mobile phones. Furthermore, according to business analysts, the Chinese internet search market is growing by 40% a year. From a long-term economic view and with both such a great number of internet users and growth of the market, the move to challenge the Chinese Communist Party may not come without a cost. Other Google's commercial activities will be affected. China Mobile, the biggest cellular company in the country, was expected to cancel a deal to use Google’s search engine on its home page. China Unicom was thought to have canceled plans to create a telephone based on Google’s Android system. And it is only the beginning, other measures are likely to come.
So others claims that Google's decision reflects a new strategy of communication. Is it a way for the firm to 'redore its image'? For sure, the conflict between Google and China is worldwide known. For the first time, and quite paradoxically, Google, which is the perfect image of an economic and capitalist giant at the age of globalization appears as a factor of freedom and liberty for Chinese people. Many international human rights groups have praised Google's move. For instance, a Paris-based rights group, Reporters Without Borders, called Google's decision a bold move which other internet companies should follow. This affair reminds us that the (forgotten?) catch phrase of the company is « Don't be Evil ». Besides, Google recently created an other way to impose itself as an advocate of the internet users against inquisitive States. Indeed, it has published online a world map indicating for each States the number of requests demanded to Google. On that map, we found that between the 1st of July 2009 and 31st December 2009 the countries with a great number of requests are Brasil, the United States and the United Kingdom. In addition to that, Google promised it will update and improve the web page every six months. However, this publication is quite superficial. Google only publishes the number of requests but not the details or categories of the requests. The request could be such different things as a demand to remove an illegal content or a demand of personal data for a police investigation. I think the next few month will confirm if Google's move is an attempt to regain prestige

The side of the Chinese authorities

First Chinese authorities have problems to understand why a foreign company entering the country does no want to respect domestic laws. That raised the philosophical and political problem of the boundaries between the moral and the law. Can someone, in the name of a moral cause claim he does not want to follow the law anymore? But, more than that, Chinese government is irritated because a western State tell him what to do in its own country. Thus, the former humiliation of the Chinese by western powers, diminished since the 2008 Olympic games, is stired up again. A journalist in the People’s Daily wrote « I'm not sure if Google knows that its arrogance can easily remind the Chinese people of the 'big powers' who cracked open China’s door by warships and cannons in the 19th century ». Therefore, this crisis between Google and China may strengthen nationalism. It could lead some Chinese companies to decide to stop collaborating with Google or some ordinary Chinese may boycott the Californian firm. On the contrary, from a worldwide perspective, Google's decision is a major blow to China's international image. Indeed, it reminds China may be a huge ecomonic power in the world, it is also a huge dictatorship. Many countries have condemned the censorship in China, and the U.S. authorities have broadly supported Google. Therefore, Chinese government is not only facing a rebel American company but is, above all, involved in a battle to get the soft power.
Concerning collusions, while China is accused of hiring hackers to get information on defenders of human rights in China, Chinese government accused Google of collaborating with U.S. spy agencies. Indeed, the Chinese newspaper People’s Daily, an organ of the ruling Communist Party published an article saying ‘‘In fact, Google is not a virgin when it comes to values. Its cooperation and collusion with the U.S. intelligence and security agencies is well-known".
Moreover, the Chinese government damn the fact that an American company could defy censorship by re-rerounting the search engine to Hong-Kong. That underlines the « one country, two systems » policy, which is for sure quite paradoxal and unfair. By re-routing its website to Hong-Kong, Google may think it behaved properly because it did not break any Chinese law but for Chinese authorities this decision only strengthen the political controversy.
For sure, Chinese government will censor the content of the Hong-Kong based search engine. Until now, it is possible to use Google.com.hk in China but all the contentious issues and pictures are banned. In the future, will Google.com.hk be completly impossible to acess in China, as other foreign website such as Twitter? It is not so sure since some people are arguing Chinese authorities might be wary of agitating loyal Google users in China, because they tend to be highly educated and vocal.

Beyond the demand of the Chinese government for Google to practice self-censorship, there is a whole system of censorship of the Internet. Fifteen years ago, The internet was set in China, mainly for economic reasons, since penetrating the telecom market was essential. However, the Chinese authorities knew it will also mean unofficial information could spread more freely. In order to avoid this feared consequence, the Internet censorship was set in the country. It is called The Great Firewall, in reference to The Great Wall that protected China from the invaders several centuries ago. The difference between those two walls is that The Great Firewall is not only protecting China from outside threats but also from inside threats. Chinese authorities are setting firewalls for any content which is not politically correct. Therfore all the contents including sex, violence, firearms, political plurality, political institutions, territories who wants to be independant from China, religion, some historical events...are banned. Several foreign websites are almost impossible or completely impossible to access, such as Youtube, Facebook, Twitter or Blogspot. On the Web, the censorship task is hard and tens of thousands people are hired in the so-called cyber-police. Chinese government also hires some internet users as « 5 yuans workers », earning 5 yuan for each pro-government comment posted on the internet. The censorship tendancy is going to increase and to create a Website, now one must register to the local authorities, showing a proof of identity. Beside censorship, repression measures are hard: China is the number one country which have people in jail because of their behaviour on the Internet. With the Google crisis, a new step has been crossed. Chinese authorities have not not only used the Internet to keep their pro-governmental propaganda, they have used the Internet as a weapon to discover and condemned their political dissidents.
The great censorship of the Internet does not mean the chinese Web is quite reduced. Indeed, the foreign consored websites are replaced by domestic ones. Most of the time, these Chinese Websites are quite similar to the partially censored or fully censored one. Thus, the Chinese twin of Facebook is Renren, Google has Baidu and Youtube has Qiyi. The only difference between these Websites is that the domestic ones can be fully pro-governmental oriented. They breadly benefit from the governemental support and netword. Thereby, China is the only country around the world where none of them, Google, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, eBay, Yahoo, Amazon, is the leader of its line of business. They are all oustripped by a Chinese competitor. That is probably why the leaders of Google have said that the censorship was not only a matter of politics, but also a trade issue since local companies are favored. However, we cannot jump into drastic conclusion, local companies are also chosen by the Internet users because they better respond to a specific local Web culture.

From the analysis of the two sides, it can be felt that two broader issues are at stake : the rise of a worldwide ethical debate over the Internet companies and the Chinese society and the control of the Internet

III) Perspective

Google's decision launched an ethical debate over the Internet companies

Google's leader decision to re-route Google.cn to Google.hk.com has now raised a larger issue for other Western companies and democratic governments, which is whether China's gross and growing abuse of the Internet should be quietly tolerated or actively resisted.

Should the companies, in spite of their economic interests, take into consideration moral issues?
Until Google's decision, it seems that for the Internet companies, economy was the priority. Indeed, Google was first non-reluctant to autocensorship. Skype is still non-reluctant, and Yahoo too. Yahoo was even been involved in huge scandal few years ago, by giving some informations about human rights activists to the Chinese government that eventually led to the arrestation of these activists. Yahoo was condemned by the American governement, but never he had though about stopping the censorship in China.
After Google's decision, it is the same. Many companies have criticized Google's decision, saying it will be marginalized in the world's most populous country and third-largest economy. "Just because the situation got bad for you doesn't mean it's bad for everybody else," says Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of the Web site Search Engine Land. Thus, auto-censorship is still very common for many of the Internet companies. For instance, Microsoft censors Chinese language searches of Bing both in and outside of China and Apple has blocked Chinese from downloading appplications related to Dalai lama.
However, Google's decision have also set the path for other companies who were hesitating. Thus, two days after Google's withdrawal, Internet domain registrar GoDaddy.com announced it had stopped selling new Web domain names in China. Christine Jones, Go Daddy's general counsel said "We don't want to be an agent for the Chinese government". Twitter became even more radical than Google. Twitter is impossible to access in China for many months, because of the government censorship. The leaders of this compony have recently annouced they were working on finding a way to defy the censorship, no matter if Chinese authorities would like it or not. Thus, companies around the world are now realizing they have to think through and figure out how to respond to these kinds of controls and not just in China but in other parts of the world.

Should democratic governments allow auto-censorship of international companies in those countries or implement laws to avoid it?
The standoff between Google and China has also awakened governments and provoked among them the debate about how Internet businesses should operate in a country with a questionable record of protecting the online privacy and freedom of expression of its citizens. In the United States, the country in the world who has a lot of influence in terms of soft power, officials are pushing for new policies to ensure the protection of American Internet businesses in China and other countries. However, in our globalized world, a worldwide initiative could have better influence and avoid a battle between few countries for political interests. Moreover, on the backdrop, we can feel a wider battle which concerns the American attempt to impose its softpower around the world. Therefore, regulate the ethical debate with law regulation is complex and could lead to political controversy.

So, how companies could operate in countries like China, when they are in the middle of the soft power battlefield?
A recent initiative is full of hope and may clarify the situation. In 2008, the Global Network Initiative was created. It is a coalition of major U.S. Internet companies like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo, as well as think tanks and universities. The group wants to provide businesses a template for addressing the ethical problems that face the Internet companies. They meet periodically to draft and update guidelines on what procedures to take when, for example, foreign governments ask for sensitive information about users. Therefore, we assist to the creation of sort of a code of behaviour for the Internet companies, which could balance economic interest and ethical considerations.

Chinese society and the control of the Internet

Under the rules of the dictatorship, the Internet could be used in China to release pressure. In a way, the use of the Internet avoids social disorder. Indeed, the Internet satisfied the people in their will of freedom and the censorship avoids any trouble. However, it is not so easy and The Great Firewall is not totally impassable. Indeed, it is possible to defy the censorship with some specific Websites such as Freegate, Puff and Ultra Surf, or with the use of proxy servers, SHH protocole or Virtual Private Networks. A recent study reveals who are the Internet users who defy the censorship. Most of them are highly educated and young. 2/3 of them defy the consorship every day and they do it for four main reasons. They want to acess an uncensored search engine such as Google, they want to go on social network websites such as Twitter, share videos websites such as Youtube or foreign Web newspapers. The most interesting data of this study is the spread of the skill: 85% of these persons have taught they friends how to defy the censorship. So, even if the control of the internet is accepted by the society because most of the people do not know there is a broad censorship, some people are aware of that and easily managed to cross The Great Firewall.

Moreover, when Google left China, it was not without some protestations. Flowers have been put in front of Google's main building in China, as if Google was dead. On the Web, a Chinese tweet said « It is not Google which withdraws from China, it is China which withdraws from the world ». In addition to that, an open letter has been written by some Internet users. They want more details about the censorship. Indeed, except sex, violence, and games who are clearly specified in the Chinese law, it is really hard to guess what the government considered as non politicaly correct. The limit-setting of the censorship is confused and the writters of the open letter demand the creation of group of independant citizens who could help to arbitrate censorship problems.

Thus, the Internet in China is both an amazing way to strengthen the government and a subversive way to denounce it. Chinese authorities may have won a battle making the Californian Google out of China, they will have to face their own Internet users and citizens. Since the 2008 Olympic games, Chinese authorities have accelerated the censorship process. They should be aware of the importance of keeping a balance between liberty and control, or the entire system they have set could turn against them.