Two days ago, Google dropped a bomb by announcing its intentions to cease censoring its search engine results in China, partly because the search giant claimed that attempts were made to crack the GMial accounts of Chinese human rights activists. The Chinese government has officially replied to these allegations. Update: More on the infrastructure of the attack.
The Chinese government states that companies, domestic or otherwise, have to abide by Chinese laws. "We welcome international Internet companies to do business in China in accordance with the law," said Jiang Yu, a spokesperson for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She didn't deny Google's allegations of cyber attacks directly, but did state that such attacks are illegal under Chinese law.
Jiang Yu further stated that "the Chinese government administers the Internet according to law and we have explicit stipulations over what content can be spread on the Internet". Of course, this case isn't about the censoring in and of itself - Google has been active in China for years, and just like many other Western companies and governments, had no qualms about catering to China's censorship and other totalitarian practices.
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