快訊：穀歌官方宣布考慮全麵退出中國市場(圖)
北京時間1月13日早間消息，據國外媒體報道，穀歌在其官方博客上宣布，該公司不願再對其中國版搜索引擎Google.cn的搜索結果進行審查，並承認這項決定可能意味著Google.cn將不得不關閉，可能連穀歌駐中國的辦事處也會關閉。
穀歌(Google Inc.)表示正在評估公司中國業務運營的可行性，並可能完全退出中國市場，因為該公司透露，他們遭受了據信來自中國大陸的重大網絡襲擊。
穀歌周二在一份博客文章中表達了上述想法。穀歌在博文中稱，去年12月中旬，他們偵測到一次來自中國、針對公司基礎架構的高技術、有針對性的攻擊，這次攻擊導致其知識產權被盜。
該博文說，穀歌相信攻擊者的目標是進入中國人權活動人士的Gmail賬戶，但似乎隻有兩個Gmail賬戶被進入。
由穀歌首席法律顧問大衛·多姆德(David Drummond)執筆的這篇博文稱，這些攻擊、攻擊所揭示的監視行為，以及在過去一年試圖進一步限製網絡言論自由的行為使得穀歌得出這樣一個結論，那就是我們應該評估中國業務運營的可行性。
多姆德寫道，公司已經決定不願再審查我們在Google.cn上的搜索結果，因此，如果可能，公司將在未來幾周公司和中國政府討論在什麽樣的基礎上我們能夠在法律框架內運營未經過濾的搜索引擎。我們承認這很可能意味著公司將不得不關閉Google.cn，以及我們在中國的辦公室。
穀歌在同意審查其搜索結果的情況下於2006年推出了中文搜索引擎Google.cn。
Google to end China censorship after e-mail breach
By MICHAEL LIEDTKE
The Associated Press
Tuesday, January 12, 2010; 8:17 PM
SAN FRANCISCO -- Google Inc. will stop censoring its search results in China and may pull out of the country completely after discovering that computers hackers had tricked human rights activists into opening their e-mail accounts to outsiders.
The change-of-heart announced Tuesday heralds a major shift for Google, which has repeatedly said it will obey Chinese laws that require some politically and socially sensitive issues to be blocked from search results that are available in other countries.
Google disclosed in a blog post that it had detected a "highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China." Further investigation revealed that "a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists," Google said in the post written by Chief Legal Officer David Drummond.
Google did not specifically accuse the Chinese government. But the company long associated with a motto of "don't be evil" added that it is "no longer willing to continue censoring our results" on its Chinese search engine, as the government requires. Google said the decision could force it to shut down its Chinese site and its offices in the country.
It's unclear how much of a blow to its business Google would suffer by pulling out. China has the world's largest population of Internet users, but Google has struggled to expand in the country, where it has less than 30 percent of the search market, versus more than 60 percent for local rival Baidu Inc.
The larger effect could be in how global Internet companies operate in China.
"Google has taken a bold and difficult step for Internet freedom in support of fundamental human rights," said Leslie Harris, president of the Center for Democracy & Technology, a civil-liberties group in Washington. "No company should be forced to operate under government threat to its core values or to the rights and safety of its users."
Danny O'Brien, international outreach coordinator at the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco, said Google's rejection of government demands to censor "changes the game because the question won't be 'How can we work in China?' but 'How can we create services that Chinese people can use, from outside of China?'"
But Clothilde Le Coz, Washington director for Reporters Without Borders, warned that Google's move doesn't necessarily mean more information will be available to the average Chinese person.
"The Chinese government is one of the most efficient in terms of censoring the Web," she said. The media watchdog group has long criticized Google and other Internet companies for caving to China's censorship regime.
A spokesman for the Chinese consulate in San Francisco had no immediate comment.
Google, whose headquarters is in Mountain View, Calif., first agreed to censor search results in China in 2006 when it created a version of its search engine bearing China's Web suffix, ".cn." Previously, Chinese-language results had been available through the company's main Google.com site.
To obtain its Chinese license, Google agreed to omit Web content that the country's government found objectionable. At the time Google executives said they struggled with how to reconcile the censorship concessions with the company's "don't be evil" motto.
By then Yahoo Inc. had come under fire for giving Chinese officials information about the online activities of two journalists, who were then arrested, convicted and sentenced to 10-year prison terms for allegedly leaking state secrets and political writings. Meanwhile, Microsoft Corp. was criticized for shutting down, at Beijing's request, a popular Chinese blog that touches on sensitive topics such as press freedoms.
