THE SAGA concerning web giant Google’s threat to leave China over cyber-spying and censorship continued yesterday after the company denied reports that it had already made a decision and was set to quit the world’s biggest internet market.
Google, the world’s most popular search engine, said last week it was considering quitting China after suffering a sophisticated cyber-attack on its network, focusing on rights activists.
Google said it was no longer willing to filter content on its Chinese language google.cn, and the announcement captured the attention of China’s 384 million internet users – the world’s largest internet market by users, with blogs and local media citing unnamed insiders as saying Google had already decided to close its offices in China.
However, a company employee, who wished to remain anonymous said that no decision had been made yet and Google was still negotiating with the government.
He said Google employees in China were just as surprised as anyone else when the blog posting went up at 7am local time last Wednesday.
“We got quite a surprise. But the company looks after you well, so we’re not worried,” he said.
China has tried to play down Google’s threat to leave, saying there were many ways to resolve the issue. But it insisted all foreign companies, Google included, must abide by Chinese laws.
Meanwhile, the Alibaba e-commerce group described as “reckless” remarks by its major shareholder Yahoo that it stood aligned with Google’s positions.
“Alibaba Group has communicated to Yahoo! that Yahoo’s statement that it is ‘aligned’ with the position Google took last week was reckless given the lack of facts in evidence,” the firm said in a statement on Saturday.
Alibaba, which runs Taobao, China’s largest online retailer, as well as China’s largest e-commerce website Alibaba.com, wants Yahoo to sell its stake in the wider group. But Yahoo views the now multibillion dollar stake in Alibaba as a key investment in China.
As if to tantalise western firms into staying in China, a government research group released data at the weekend saying its population of web users soared nearly 30 per cent last year to 384 million as the number of people surfing the web by mobile phone more than doubled.
The Google dispute risks deepening the growing rift between China and the US.
Relations are already strained by arguments over the Chinese currency’s exchange rate, trade protectionism and US arms sales to Taiwan.