Internet vs China

Date: February 02, 2006
Source: SFGate.com


Congressional human rights advocates Wednesday hammered four Internet giants -- Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Cisco Systems -- for helping Chinese authorities censor Web information and crack down on cyber-dissidents and warned that bipartisan legislation to prevent such cooperation could move forward rapidly.

The four companies have found a rapidly growing market in China, where there are now more than 110 million Internet users, second only to the United States. But the Internet industry has been castigated for its reported cooperation with Chinese authorities who have demanded strict controls, including software that detects and filters out such sensitive words or phrases as "democracy," "Dalai Lama,'' "Tiananmen massacre'' and "China torture'' and blocks access to certain chat rooms and bulletin boards.

"These massively successful high-tech companies, which couldn't bring themselves to send their representatives to this meeting today, should be ashamed,'' said Rep. Tom Lantos, D-San Mateo, at a meeting of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus.
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