Google, China and espionage

The world's attention is appropriately centered on the immense tragedy in Haiti, but the story about Google's battle with China over cyber espionage has drawn a huge internet audience and a strong comment stream from a different crowd of readers.

Some readers cheer Google for its threat to shut down its Chinese web operations because of cyberattacks and censorship originating in China. There are scoffers who say that Google has cooperated with U.S. intelligence authorities to spy on its own citizens. There are those who think China is too a big a market for Google to ignore, no matter the costs, and there are the advice givers with several suggestions on how to solve the problem.

As Ariana Eunjung Cha and Ellen Nakashima write, "Security experts say the attacks showed a new level of sophistication, exploiting multiple flaws in different software programs and underscoring what senior administration officials have said over the past year is an increasingly serious cyber threat to the nation's critical industries."

We'll start with dsrobins, who wrote, "Google should pull out of China and the sooner the better. Google shamed itself when it first went in and cravenly submitted to the internet access provisions the Chinese dictatorship demanded. It has now helped suppress many protests of Chinese people seeking freedom all across the nation, most shamefully so the Uighurs and Tibetans. Companies that supported corrupt dictatorships like Hitler and Mussolini were punished and it should be no diffent with Google today."

But mugengsr1 said, "Google needs China. China DOES NOT need Google. Google wants to dominate the world, and 1/3 of the world lives in China. Bottomline. Google's threats are hollow."

democratus wrote, "I work in Network security and I can tell you that the majority of worldwide hack attempts emanate from the Asian side of the world. It is a daily, no hourly, occurrence. If you start blocking one IP range others pop up. There is a thread that goes through China around this type of activity and it is closely related to their R&D (Receive and Duplicate)."

shahjahanbhatti1 said, "Google users worldwide appreciate Google administrators for blowing the whistle. Internet facility is not compatible with communism where everything is owned by the party."

CrtiticalMass wrote, "China is a mercantilist state that does not intend to conduct business within established norms of conduct. No respect whatever for intellectual property, no compunction against outright theft, no laws restricting foreign bribes, nada. the country is basically a bandit that manipulates its currency and does these other things so they can rob other countries. Time to cut them off."

Intuition1010 said, "First, everyone using Google knows they keep track of searches. If they don't then they have not read any of the user service agreements or Articles regarding Google. Google has always been upfront with that information. There is quite a difference between monitoring what users are Googling and SPYING/HACKING into private accounts....especially accounts owned by other countries! I think they call it espionage.........!"

rapp_mitch asked, "Can someone explain to me what Google being in China has to do with the attacks and how pulling out of China will prevent future attacks? Can't China just attack the Google servers in the US?"

debv8604 wrote, "Business is business. Consumers can make a difference in who succeeds. Google should pull out of China because maybe, just maybe, consumers will stay away from Google. Of course, those consumers would really have to care about China's disregard for quality products, products that do not harm and those pesky privacy and IP laws."

sgr_astar said, "There is no problem for google to track down that the hack attack came from the Chinese authority. As a result, they should have enough ground to take the authority to the court. Failing to do so is not going to teach the Chinese web police a lesson. It is also worth noting that the Chinese market is not free, and should not be allowed in WTO in the first place."

TopnotchInChina advised that "...Google is currently inviting a tiger for diner at its table. If Google is not careful, the tiger will eat its food on its plate, Googles food and then Google! The only way to stay on top for Google is to separate completely World versus China. Run Google China the same way as they are running Baidu and the others. Become a Tiger attacking other Tiger"

But steveandjanereed1 wrote, "It doesn't matter. The Chinese people will demand for themselves unfettered access eventually. No matter how high the brittle walls of ego built by the Chinese leadership culture. On the other hand, it could be argued that the leadership is just managing a soft landing trying to avoid major social upheaval in a country undergoing such vast changes. I wouldn't argue that however."

GMinChina said, "...By the way, The U.S. government, with assistance from major telecommunications carriers including AT&T, has engaged in a massive program of illegal dragnet surveillance of domestic communications and communications records of millions of ordinary Americans since at least 2001... Is Google going to make a statement with Uncle Sam and quit US market?"

Rudy7 wrote, "Guess what? Corporate and government espionage and the muzzling some forms of free speech -- including by Western governments and privately-owned media companies -- is a worldwide fact of life. No doubt Google itself has been involved in such activities as a means of expanding its business. So what is the big deal unless everybody quits doing it?"

juggernautenterprises said, "I applaud Google for not rolling over while crying, 'Why won't somebody do something about their behavior.'... Notice also that they didn't pull out. They've knowingly put themselves in a position to be thrown out by refusing continued censorship. They also didn't directly accuse the government. By constructing this framework, Goggle is showing great negotiating skill."

wts11 wrote, "Is is another case of American's meddling in Chinese affairs. This is totally politically motivated with the cover of cypersecurity/cyperspying... At the same time, you enlist the help of the cop in the world to intimidate your neighbor through newspaper stories in WaPo, NYT and like. All this is a conspiracy but to undermine your neighbor. I'd say, get out and get lost if I were your neighbor."

MILWI said, "Take a stand, make a statement, Google. Get out of China. That country is run by a bunch of nasties."

We'll close with one of those exchanges that demonstrates the self-correcting nature of internet comment streams:

joeblow8 wrote, "Chinese are a lower form of life."

And drifter1999_99 replied immediately, "joeblow8, what kind of trash are you!"

All comments on this article are here.