February 15, 2006

WASHINGTON - Google and Yahoo found themselves denigrated as tools of China's Communist government in a congressional hearing Wednesday that led Yahoo to apologize for inadvertently assisting in the arrest of a Chinese dissident and Google to state that it could abandon China if censorship causes major business disruptions.

The two Internet giants were among four computer companies summoned to Capitol Hill to answer questions and face rebukes for their business activities in China, which have involved acquiescing to Chinese censorship laws.

The hearing - and the withering criticisms directed at the four - put into stark relief the complexities and compromises facing the high-flying Internet companies as they try to follow traditional American exporters in building global brands.

Unlike automakers or consumer products marketers, when companies like Yahoo and Google do business in countries with repressive regimes, they at times are accused of being complicit in supporting censorship and stifling political dissent.

This is an even more sensitive issue for the Internet companies because of the powerful image they have cultivated as champions of open communication.

Indeed, the central question of the hearing - and the conundrum before these big businesses - was whether they have a moral obligation to reject China's demands.

Yahoo received a stinging admonition for turning over e-mail account information that led to the imprisonment of a Chinese dissident, Shi Tao. A Yahoo affiliate in China provided the information without requiring a court order from Chinese authorities.

Google came in for perhaps the strongest criticism at the hearing. The Internet giant launched a China version of its search engine that blocks users from obtaining information about the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Falun Gong religious group, and other topics banned by Chinese censors.

"This makes you a functionary of the Chinese government," U.S. Rep. Jim Leach, R-Iowa, said after eliciting testimony from Google's representative indicating that the company models its list of forbidden search terms directly from those on official Chinese search engines.

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During the course of the hearing, aides to U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., circulated the draft of a bill that would limit the China activities of U.S.-based Internet firms, and the U.S. State Department on Tuesday announced plans to lead a new international task force that would promote free expression on the Internet.

Smith's bill would require U.S.-based Internet companies to locate their computer servers outside of China, presumably out of the reach of Chinese censors. The proposal seems tailored to block censors from seizing computer files and arresting dissidents who use the Internet to, in the view of authorities, foment social unrest in China.

However, operating from outside the country could eliminate crucial business opportunities, including selling local advertising.

Smith acknowledged that any actions must be carefully considered, given that U.S. companies have invested more than $30 billion in China. Smith and other representatives argued that the censorship problem cannot be solved simply by placing limitations on U.S.-based Internet providers. U.S. government action and coordinated industry action will be needed, they said.

The policy proposals come after a string of embarrassing disclosures about various ways in which U.S.-based Internet companies have accommodated Chinese censors, decisions that have led in some cases to the arrest of Chinese dissidents. Besides contributing to the arrest of Shi and another dissident, Li Zhi, Yahoo also has signed a pledge of "self-discipline," promising to follow China's censorship laws.

Microsoft blocks sensitive terms from its MSN search engine. Last December, it also shut down the blog of Zhao Jing, who called on reporters for the Beijing News to walk off their jobs after an editor was fired for reporting news of unrest in southern China.

Cisco sells the computers that make China's Internet work. Congressmen at the hearing sought unsuccessfully to elicit testimony indicating that the company also provides training to China's security forces on how to block search terms on the Internet.

Perhaps the most outraged response came from U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos, from San Mateo, Calif., near Silicon Valley, who is also a Holocaust survivor and outspoken human rights advocate.

"These captains of industry should have been developing new technologies to bypass the sickening censorship of government and repugnant barriers to the Internet," Lantos said. "Instead, they enthusiastically volunteered for the Chinese censorship brigade."