Google Creating State-Controlled Censored Search Engine for China

in #censorship6 years ago

Google was once seen as a bastion of freedom online, with the motto "don't be evil", but it seems they don't have issue in aiding to crush freedom of access to information these days. Google's search engine and their video platform YouTube is getting more and more into censoring or altering search results for content they disprove of. It seems only natural that they would accept to create a censored and state-controlled search engine for the most populated country on the planet.


Source1: wikimedia, Source2: pixabay

A project code-named Dragonfly is underway since 2017, according to internal documents. The development has sped up since the December 2017 meting between Google CEO Sundar Pichai and a top official from the Chinese government. Different versions named "Maotai" and "Longfei" have been demonstrated, with plans to officially launch in 6-9 months.

This search engine will "blacklist websites and search terms about human rights, democracy, religion and peaceful protests", according to The Intercept. The Chinese government doesn't like people learning things that can help them become more free, and Google is willing to help them crush human freedom.

Google has formerly taken aim at China's policy to censor the internet access of it's citizens. But things have changed. Google currently can't be accessed by Chinese citizens as it's blocked by the state Internet infrastructure in what is referred to as the "Great Firewall". The new app will fully comply with all to the Chinese government's requirements for censorship law and regulations. Whatever is deemed harmful to the government, the Communist party or its leadership will be blacklisted.

The "Great Firewall" already does a great job. Content about freedom of speech, political opponents, news, sex, history and university studies are all under the communist thumb. The famous Tiananmen Square massacre is an inaccessible piece of history since it makes them government look bad.

It's Orwellian, but most people in China probably wouldn't know that reference, since Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm are prohibited through much online access. The censorship also prevents interaction with the Western world through social media, where they might more easily learn about the topics the government doesn't want them too. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are a no-go, with apps of a similar nature being exclusive to China to keep things in a tight cultural censorship loop.

Google has wanted to break into the Chinese market for a long time, but the firewalls and laws have made that problematic. I guess they finally decided "what the hell, let's just give in anf get a piece of the pi!" Who cares about making the world less evil, since "don't be evil" is no longer their slogan.

How can Google claim it support a free and open internet while it partners up with the censoring communist Chinese government? That's just a claim that isn't supported regardless of this new partnership, since it's been known to censor alternative and conservative right-leaning informational content on the search engine and on YouTube.

Money talks, money walks, and Google is walking and talking the Chinese line for their bottom line. Getting access to all those Chinese shoppers is the choice Google seems to be making.


Thank you for your time and attention. Peace.


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I use brave now instead of google. I'm boycotting FANG

"brave" ist based on "chromium", started by... guess :-)
google.
I use Yandex - the Russian stuff. Browser as well as search-engine (it finds also all the stuff censored on google).
Maybe the Russians also spy us - but I don't care at all about them.

The Chinese searchenginge "baidu" is not bad. For lot topics it finds much more than google. Google results are badly censored on lot of critical information.

brave instead of chrome you mean? (browsers)

i use Brave too, do great !

I still find it ironic that a company who had the motto, "don't be evil" for such a long time has been known to be engaged in anti-consumerist, anti-competitive and government lobbyist behaviour for a very long time.

Google removed the motto because they've become so big they don't have to be ethical or appease to the do-gooders anymore. Nobody else is on the same level, Google is the bank of Internet based companies. They're in bed with governments, heavily lobby lawmakers for their own benefit and worse of all, seem to be hellbent on pursuing artificial intelligence even though many warn against it.

The thing with China is their economy is so big and powerful, many companies are willing to look the other way and ignore the human rights abuses if it means getting a chance to capture even a single digit percentage of the China market because that would still be a lot bigger than other countries like Australia.

Make no mistake Google and Amazon are both going to destroy mankind. Both are in bed with governments and all for the sake of making a few billion in profit, but at what cost?

Yup, Google was set to take over the world, so many apps online. I remember they had an awesome collaboration project thing where you could draw together, like a whiteboard, then they removed that. AI will be the death of humanity as I see it :/

Yeah, getting into the China market has been key for the past decades. Communist-capitalist merger that seems to work well as long as you do what the state allows u to and not more ... Amazon is a giant now for sure. Revolutionized how ppl buy things world-over...

At the end of the day, companies like Google still value their businesses in China. It is not difficult to understand why they do this given how big the Chinese market is. There are other search engines, e.g. DuckDuckGo, that can be used to circumvent these censorship. However, there is still the Great Firewall to deal with. What the people of China truly need, is an internet connection protocol which is resistant to censorship. Therefore, I believe decentralizing the internet is the way to go for them. Solutions like Substratum, Skycoin and MaidSafe might take off in China because of their Great Firewall and other censorship.

Can people in China learn about them or is already censored in searches :P

That might be the case. But words of good stuff will still spread even without internet ;)

There is no point... they have Baidu and other versions for themselves... why have google that’s just completely censored...

I was living out there recently and some younger generation have VPNs (I needed one to get on anything familiar) but they only really use it for Instagram it seemed. The internet is so censored out there it’s really crazy, I was quite surprised. But it is what it is I guess...

I would probably encourage more people have have vpns just to be able to open their mind a bit with research

Damn, crazy place to be in. They accept what they have and make the best use of it I guess... plus they do't know what their missing as they don't have it...

@krnel, Nowadays in my opinion YouTube is dominating content creators and there were some cases to hear where channels are banned without any reason.

And this is not the right behaviour and this is against our Freedom for sure, and unfortunate thing is, nowadays people are easily misleaded, and before what they found wrong now they supporting it.

Nowadays the process of Manipulation and Deceiving is increased but, in my opinion the tools are reflected in a way that people are thinking this is right but in reality that's not the right aspect at all.

And if we will not wake up from this false times then in future it will going to completely overtake our freedom and at the end of the day we will going to be made Slave.

Wishing you an great day and stay blessed. 🙂

A platform would need to be decentralized or in a cooperative structure for a community to determine what is allowed or not. A private company can always choose who to allow or not.

That's absolutely true.

Pfff I don't get it. Where is it leading us? It seems the capitalism comply with whatever country with good economy says.
At the end as Zizek has stated, the future of the world will be in the hands of capitalism with the Asian values, having all the economic aspects of the current system but with dictators.

Yeah, communist CHina has integrated lots of capitalism into it;s state controlled economy, and did well.

I wouldn't expect any less from google. Plus, I am sure that they are just practicing so they can quietly implement the same type of censorship here.

These free speech issues are getting worse and few seem to notice. It worries me a bit.

there is already censorship, where are all those search results providing me links to all type of warez stuff :)
internet was better before google!
Long live The Free Internet and The Pirate Bay !

Truth. I remember the days of dial up and AOL.

Yeah, they could bring it here later, but then a competitor can just move in to take the users that leave.

This search engine will "blacklist websites and search terms about human rights, democracy, religion and peaceful protests"

It is a total shame that google is willing to create a tool knowing it will be used to keep people ignorant about important subjects such as those.

Seems like this company only cares about helping governments abuse people's freedom (china) and privacy (usa).

Thanks for the article mate, I wasn't aware of these events.

Yeah, keeping people down, a boot on the face of the Chinese in a way :/

The LOVE of money not money itself, is the root of all evil. It sounds like Google has embraced its love for evil. When you dance with wickedness you change rather than the evil wicked partner for whom you dance. Google has chosen it's partner. Thanks @krnel

Yup, they have chosen their new partner.

Goolag appears to be showing it's true colors.

Sadly.

Thanks!

LOL, Goolag :P