http://p2pnet.net/story/2490 Google helps 'China Matrix' p2pnet.net News:- Google has denied claims that its Chinese service is censoring news. However, the ceo of a company which runs services aimed at allowing Chinese people to access un-filtered news has condemned Google practices he says are helping the Chinese authorities to maintain an online 'matrix' which keeps people from finding out the truth. A volunteer working with Dynamic Internet Technology's DynaWeb - a free proxy network created to circumvent internet blocking in China - noticed Google's Chinese news returned different results depending whether the search was conducted in China or in the US. DynaWeb is . DIT ceo Bill Xia told p2pnet he'd confirmed the report through proxies in China. "Search results inside China do not contain news from blocked sites such as www.epochtimes.com.au." A Google spokeswoman told p2pnet, "In order to create the best possible news search experience for our users, we sometimes decide not to include some sites, for a variety of reasons". "For example, they may display improperly in our service, or be inaccessible to users. We have not included links to a number of sources that are not accessible to mainland China Internet users. These sources were not included because their sites are inaccessible and therefore their inclusion does not provide a good experience for our News users who are looking for information. These sources represent only a tiny fraction of the sources available in simplified Chinese." Website Matrix However, "The Chinese government controls the media and the military and through them, is able to create a 'Matrix' that hides websites that relate to civil rights and opinions the Chinese authorities don't want people to see," DIT ceo Bill Xia told p2pnet. "And of course, these are the only places people can find this find of 'forbidden information' and by excluding them, Google is actively helping the Chinese government to enhance its 'Matrix'. "This exercise is no different to Yahoo China's exclusion of oversea sites when words such as "Falun Gong" are searched. "I condemn it and urge the public to demand that Google explains how it's able to justify the practice." Xia also noted that he'd demonstrated that Google is using geographical differentiation to display different results to different locations. Google has a minority share in Baidu.com, a Chinese search engine. "Baidu is the largest independent search engine, but much smaller than the leading portals Sohu.com and Sina.com," says Poynteronline, going on: China 'particularly tough' Two years ago, Baidu put itself on the media radar and angered many Chinese Internet users. China's censors had installed new filtering software to keep unwanted information out of the country. For yet unclear reasons, Google was very prominent on the hit list of those new IT-goodies and people who wanted to Google ended mostly up in the Baidu.com website." Internal Google documents obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle say in Europe, Google is the clear search leader but Asia is, "an entirely different story". The company was No 3 in Hong Kong and only No 10 in Japan. "China is also considered to be particularly tough," says the story. "Many Chinese companies already dominate the search market there. In June, Google invested a reported $10 million in one of them, Baidu." The Chronicle story also points out that wherever Google has offices, "it faces a variety of laws. In some cases, that includes filtering Web sites for illegal content. "Google has blocked more than 100 such Web sites in France and Germany, according to a study by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. Google insists that it is merely complying with the law and that the filtering does not affect search results elsewhere in the world." ================== See:- proxies - Google China censors news, p2pnet, September 16, 2004 particularly tough - Google making its mark worldwide, San Francisco Chronicle, September 20, 2004 Baidu.com - Google Invests in Baidu, Poynter Online, June 15, 2004 ================== NOTE: If you're Chinese and you're looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent website blocking outside of China. Download it here. ================== Apologies to Google: We inadvertently posted the incorrect draft of this article with the heading *Google runs 'China Matrix'* The headline should have been as it is now - *Google helps 'China Matrix'*. Unfortunately, once the Google bots snag a headline, it's locked in and the wrong head will continue to show up on Google. (Monday 20th September 2004) --

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