Free Tibet Campaign deplores the announcement by Google that it is to capitulate to political pressure from China by providing a web-based search engine for the Chinese market which will prohibit access to information about Tibet and other sensitive political issues, such as the protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989. Google's rivals Yahoo! and Microsoft already censor their sites in accordance with Chinese government wishes. 

Alison Reynolds of Free Tibet Campaign said:

"With this move Google's motto 'do no evil' is in smithereens and - through its collusion - Google is endorsing censorship and repression. This also further contradicts those political leaders who attempt to convince us that foreign business can change China for the better: here is just one more example of where China has changed foreign business for the worse.

"The first point of Google's philisophy is 'focus on the user and all else will follow'", added Ms Reynolds. "Clearly, with this decision, Google is putting the wishes of an oppressive regime first!"

Free Tibet Campaign has already protested to Google about its service 'Google Earth', in which the word Tibet is not recognised ('Lhasa, Tibet' produces no results in the search engine, where 'Lhasa, China' is accepted). A protest from the Taiwanese, who objected to Taiwan being described as a 'Province of China' prompted a climb-down by Google, and the contentious words were removed.

Google Q & A

Q: What have Google done?
Google recently launched a new search platform that censors and distorts information on topics sensitive to the Chinese government such as "Tibet," "human rights," "democracy," "Falun Gong," and hundreds more.

Q: What is your position on other companies such as Yahoo! and Microsoft etc.,
Free Tibet Campaign objects to any activity by companies which contribute to violation of human rights and repression of basic freedoms by China's authorities, including restriction on freedom of expression and freedom of religion.

Q: Isn't it better for Google to be engaged in China in this way than not at all?
Google was already operating a Chinese-language search portal in China and in fact enjoyed the second-largest market share as well as the highest rating from users.

Q: How is Google censoring information in China and Tibet?
Google's new web search platform - Google.cn - filters search results according to criteria set by China's authorities. Moreover, not only that the search results block access to free and reliable sources of information on issues critical to people in China and Tibet, it also promotes Chinese government propaganda. For instance, a search for "Dalai Lama," will omit thousands of websites and users will be instead directed to sites and articles condemning the exiled Tibetan leader in Chinese government-run media and websites with a ".cn" suffix. Searches for other subjects sensitive to China such as "Falun Gong", "Taiwan independence," and terms such as "democracy" and "human rights" will yield similar results.

Q: How is this different than what they were already doing in China and Tibet?
In the past few years China developed a surveillance and monitoring system of the internet. It has 30,000 monitors and uses "great firewall" to police the internet and censor websites. Now, Google is doing it and more effectively. As a result it will be harder for people in China and Tibet to access real information. Indeed, access to 'sensitive' information was partially restricted on Google.com (Google's Chinese-language website in China and Tibet) as well. However, the censorship of websites and sanitizing users' search results was done by China's while Google refused to be responsible for such an action. Now, Google is effectively doing this dirty job for them.

Q: I just searched on Google.cn and it seemed normal and uncensored to me
Google.cn censors results only on searches made by people connecting to the internet from inside China and Tibet.