
 |
|
May 22, 2013
John Thorne:
They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman
May 20, 2013
Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Jan. 15, 2010
/ 29 Teves 5770
Google tells China: No more dirty work
By
Wesley Pruden
| 
|
|
|
| |
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Once upon a time the city desk at the morning newspaper was the place to call to settle bets. A city desk could expect a flurry of calls just before the bars closed. Who was Ruth Roman's first husband? Who won the 1937 Rose Bowl? What was the real name of the last Curley of the Three Stooges?
Nobody much calls city desks any longer desk men, like everyone else, hide behind voice mail and now it's Google that usually tells the curious minds who want to know that Miss Roman's first husband was Mortimer Hall, that Pittsburgh defeated Washington 21 to 0 in the 1937 Rose Bowl and the last of three actors who played Curley was Joe Besser.
But Google is important for other things, too, as China learned when the popular search engine told Beijing that it would no longer participate as a censor and would if need be leave the Middle Kingdom altogether. No more lies by omission.
Shortly after it officially told the Chinese to buzz off, the Google website answered questions about the infamous massacre at Tiananmen Square and other "sensitive" events the Chinese government pretends never happened, and tries to punish anyone who doesn't play its game. Google even got an assist from Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state, who is said to be throwing her weight, such as it is, behind the campaign against China's suppression of speech (and thought). She has already met with executives of Google and its rival, Microsoft, and Cisco Systems, one of the designers of the Chinese Internet technology to talk about how to deal with China's war on free inquiry.
The Google decision is remarkable because big corporations rarely put principle above profit, or even appear to, and indeed Google's decision is probably good business in the long run. Google's business in China lags far behind the Beijing government's own search engine, which it keeps on a short leash. In China, no news is good news.
Nevertheless, after Google's announcement a steady stream of Chinese Internet users appeared at the Google headquarters in Beijing to lay flowers on the company's colorful logo arrayed on the front lawn.
Wei Jing-sheng, the Chinese dissident who lives in exile in the United States after spending 18 years in a Chinese prison cell for speaking against his government's abuse of human rights, applauded Google for taking "an important step" to protect such rights online. "Through international pressure," he said, "finally a big business in the West has come realize its own conscience. Some Western businesses thought that by making compromises with the Chinese communists' regime, they could do business as they wished. However, this is impossible because the Chinese government would not be satisfied."
In fact, Google first tried to play the fool's game. It did Beijing's work for it, keeping "embarrassing" facts off its China service, explaining in artless argle-bargle that "the benefits of increased access to information for people in China outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results." But some gratitude. Google says that beginning in September "highly sophisticated" hackers systematically stole certain company intellectual property, and 20 other financial, technology, media and chemical companies were similarly targeted.
The London Daily Telegraph reports that British intelligence agencies warned the British government three years ago that China was one of several nations trying to wriggle through firewalls guarding sensitive British government databases. Last year, the Telegraph revealed, researchers in Toronto discovered a large cyber-espionage network called GhostNet which had prowled the Internet databases of embassies and agencies of more than a hundred nations, looking for sensitive information. A month later, hackers believed to be working for the Beijing government broke into Pentagon computers and filched details of the new Joint Strike Fighter. Some U.S. intelligence officials, the newspaper reported, had tried to draw maps of utility grids across the United States.
Pulling the chain of Chinese officials is not difficult. Computers at the French embassy in Beijing were hacked last month after President Nicolas Sarkozy entertained the Dalai Lama in Paris, according the exiled leader of Tibet the high honor that American presidents have sometimes been too timid to do. But after the Chinese objected to the French objecting to the theft of its intellectual property, France apologized for having noticed. Curley and his brother stooges would have given someone a poke in the eye.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Wesley Pruden is editor emeritus of The Washington Times. Comment by clicking here.
Wesley Pruden Archives
© 2007 Wesley Pruden
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|