The last few weeks have been very loud between China, the US, and Google. Actually, the tension started years ago when Google, and perhaps almost every American company in China, were subjected to content censorship. Although Google and most of these companies abide the local rules, one event prompted the Big G to issue a very challenging statement.
Google has decided to review its operations in China, and might consider shutting their operations down in the country, for good. This decision was made after Google found a series of security attacks to their company as well as dozens of other American companies. The attacks have been associated and linked to the Chinese government.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also denounced Internet Censorship. "Censorship should not be accepted by any company from anywhere. American companies need to make a principled stand."she said during her Internet Freedom speech a few days ago.
The Chinese government commented on the issue and said they do not have anything to do with the attacks on Google and that Sec. Clinton's remarks can 'hurt' US-China relations. They also claimed that they do not censor contents and that they are opposed to that. "The U.S. has criticized China's policies to administer the Internet and insinuated that China restricts Internet freedom...This runs contrary to the facts and is harmful to China-U.S. relations", a Chinese Ministry official said.
This issue will still go a long, long, way. It has a lot of points to be discussed, and has a lot of issues to settle. For the mean time, let us see who can stand firm to their decisions. Will Google pull out of China? Will the US fight for anti-censorship in China? And will the US-China relationship arrive at a sad ending?
