Google said January 12 that it is no longer willing to continue censoring search results on Google.cn, the company's Chinese search site, and could possibly face shutting down Google.cn and its Chinese offices, according to a statement posted on Google's official blog by company Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer David Drummond at 3 p.m.
Over the next few weeks, Google "will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all," said the statement, titled "A New Approach to China."
Google said its move was prompted by a December cyber attack, which the company believes affected at least 20 other firms and resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google. "We have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists," the statement said.
Google China CEO John Liu said December 10 that the company planned to introduce a new business strategy, under which it will use its international technology to serve Google users in China -- "not Google China, but Google in China," according to Liu's interview with CBN Weekly. Under its new strategy, Google China intends to reduce investment into wholly localized products but continue to offer its global products in China, the report said.
