TMCnet News
China says foreign Internet giants must help China block content+(Japan Economic Newswire Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)BEIJING, Feb. 14_(Kyodo) _ U.S. e-mail and Internet content providers such as Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. according to law should help China stop harmful content, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said Tuesday. Spokesman Liu Jianchao said China was doing everything possible to stop illegal Internet content, including material that "violates social morals," and said that any foreign companies operating in China should cooperate. "This kind of goal is to protect the interests of the general population, so this kind of action is fair and reasonable," Liu said at a scheduled press briefing. "If there are some foreign companies operating in China, they should also follow China's laws and regulations." Liu did not specify what kind of content China wants to stop. Free speech advocates say the government is asking foreign Internet firms to hand over user details that allow security departments to find and arrest dissidents who use the Internet to spread their views. Last Thursday, the French press freedom advocacy group Reporters without Borders called on Yahoo to disclose information on all Internet journalists and writers whose identities it has revealed to Chinese authorities. Yahoo user and Internet dissident Li Zhi was sentenced to eight years in prison in 2003 based on records that Yahoo provided to public security agents, Reporters without Borders said in a statement. Last April, Chinese journalist Shi Tao was sentenced to 10 years in prison for divulging state secrets abroad based on information that Yahoo gave to Chinese state security authorities, the group said. Google has set up a special China domain that can block politically sensitive terms, such as references to the banned Falun Gong movement, that go against the government's interests. Any overseas Internet company that wants to establish a business presence in China must follow Chinese laws, which include cooperating with law enforcement, said Nathan Midler, head of business consulting with Synovate Business Consulting in Beijing. "It's certainly not an open Internet," Midler said. "There's a lot of monitoring." Yahoo, Google and Microsoft Corp., all U.S. companies, are competing with one another and Chinese providers for a share of China's 110 million Internet users. They see a big pot of potential advertising revenue and an increasing number of paid services, Internet analysts say. |