Google in China: The Big Disconnect

This case is presented as an example and as a vehicle for discussion among the students
about the situations brought about by the use of the Internet as it crosses geographical,
political, technological, cultural, and ethical boundaries. While it is presented for
discussion purposes, there being few set answers, some points are made below to initiate
debate.

1. The political, cultural, and ethical differences between China and the U.S. regarding
use of the internet were made apparent in February 2006 when, amidst widespread
protests, Google’s executives were called into Congressional hearings and accused of
collaborating with a “repressive Chinese regime” by setting up Google’s servers within
China and complying with the government’s censorship policies. While not the only
offender, Google was being criticized because of its policy of “Don’t Be Evil.” The
Chinese government uses censorship as a political tool to control its people; however the
censorship is also a competitive tool – “a cudgel that private firms use to beat one another
with.” Those who understand Chinese culture and politics understand where the
censorship lines are drawn. As far as freedom of speech is concerned, Zhao explained
that “it’s not the speech; its’ organizing – even only just three of four people – that’s what
they crackdown on.” Other examples of the interface of Chinese culture and technology,
for example: Internet sales are hampered by China’s rudimentary banking system and the
lack of a reliable credit-card network, so that there is no easy way to receive payments
from outside the country. Chinese businesspeople rarely rely on email because they
consider leaving messages to be socially awkward; they feel they should leave live
messages, so they prefer mobile phones and short text messages. Online discussion
boards are very popular; the Chinese like the many links to chat rooms that the local
search engines provide.
In China, downloading illegal copies of music, movies and software is as normal
and accepted as checking the weather online; although this is done in the west also, it is
not as rampant, and at least is recognized to be illegal.

2. The technical details of the Firewall are in the case. Basically, anyone in China who
tries to access a Web site hosted on a server in, for example, Chicago, runs into the router
at the Chinese border; if that site is on the government’s blacklist, or if it contains
blacklisted terms, it won’t get through. Google was unavailable much of the time because
the Great Firewall slows down all traffic coming into the country from the world outside;
in 2002, Google was knocked offline by the Chinese government. Google then realized
that it would have to move its servers into China to get past the firewall. Competitively,
Google was faced with the Chinese company Baidu, which by 2005 had amassed almost
half of the Chinese search market, while Google’s was stuck at 27 percent.

3. There are two main methods China uses to censor the Web. Firstly, for companies
inside its borders, the government uses a broad array of penalties and threats to keep
content clean. Intimidation and “self-regulation” are critical to how the party
communicates its censorship rules to private-sector Internet companies. To obtain a
license, companies must sign an agreement not to circulate content on certain subjects.
Much is left to the companies to figure it out from “political readings” and from postings

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that the government objected to. Secondly, for Web sites that originate anywhere else in
the world, the government uses the Great FireWall of China, discussed in #2.
The compromises that Google’s executives made about operating in China clearly
centered around the fact that the company would then be subject to China’s self-
censorship laws, though they justified this position with the rationale that the company
was improving access to information in an authoritarian country, even though they felt it
would be years before becoming profitable in China. While facing outcry from the west
about their practices in China, the executives compromised that Google would not offer
email or blogging services in China, since that could put them in a position of being
forced to censor blog postings of hand over dissidents’ personal information to the secret
police. Google also put a disclaimer on their website that information had been removed
in accordance with Chinese law. Google learned from Yahoo, which had put individual
dissidents in serious danger, not to introduce any service that could get someone jailed.

4. Start a discussion on this case viewing ethics and social rfesponsibility from the
stakeholders stand, in this case: Google’s owners (stockholders); Google’s employees;
Google’s customers, users, and suppliers (around the world and in particular in China for
this case); the Chinese Government; and society at large, both in China and around the
world.

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