Google Inc. threatened to pull out of China on January 12 causing a shocking response from the country’s fast-growing internet industry. Google claims that it might stop censoring it’s Chinese search site and may even completely withdraw from the country. The threat triggered a flood of concern and anger from the Chinese population. In fact, students and other Chinese Internet users adorned the Google sign at Google’s offices in Beijing and Shanghai with flowers to show support for the company. Analysts say Google has an audience of more than 40 million loyal users.

A student named Xu Hao studying at Tongji University in Shanghai called the situation a “tragedy”. Another student named Wu Zhiwei attending Fudan University said, “a lot of people are very angry at government censorship.” He continued to say that he understands that China’s policies contradict Google’s philosophies on free-Internet use.

The threat followed accusations by Google which stated, a “sophisticated and targeted” cyber attack came from China in mid-December, victimizing at least 20 Chinese human rights activists. Evidently, this was an attempt by the Chinese authorities to gain access to the e-mail accounts of these Chinese human rights activists. The massive cyber attacks are clearly contrary to Google’s policies. David Drummond, senior vice president of corporate development and chief legal officer for Google, stated that, "based on our investigation to date we believe their attack did not achieve that objective." However, Drummond said that Google’s decision to no longer censor its Google site in China and consider the possibility of even shutting down its site and offices completely in China is a response to the attacks.

Google’s operations in China include a Chinese-language search engine similar to the international English-language version of the Web site. Not only does Google provide a search engine, but also other products such as news and maps specifically for China. The Web site is managed locally in China, and for this reason, must observe the regulations put out by the Chinese government. Some of these rules include the following: to filter its content by removing search results associated with pornography and politically sensitive matters. 

The situation involving Google in China and the statement Google issued was at first fully covered by China’s Internet on it’s local websites. China’s official state media provided very limited coverage of the matter. Not long after the story was released, many people from the new portals claimed that China’s official state media started to limit the reportage of the story. Several Web sites translated and displayed the statement made by David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer, on their sites. Drummond’s statement was originally posted in English on Google’s blogspot blog which is not attainable in China. Once translations of Drummond’s statement appeared on Chinese Web sites, they were removed shortly after they were reported. 

Fervent Chinese Internet users  proceeded expressing their opinions about the situation. In addition to worrying that their Google e-mail accounts would be deleted,  their concern grew about whether China would make further restrictions on their Internet access. 

Google has had great success in it’s Chinese sector since it’s start there in 2005. The China IntelliConsulting Corporation estimates that 80 million people in China enter onto Google at least once a week, and half of these people are frequent users. A managing partner from the firm, China IntelliConsulting Corp., Mr. Lu, said that if Google leaves China, it will be a “huge” impact on the Chinese Internet. 

Google’s recent activity in China includes the launch of a music service in collaboration with Top110.cn, a Chinese company, and with the world’s four largest music labels, Warner Music Group Corp., Vivendi SA’s Universal Music, EMI Group Ltd., and Sony Corp.’s Sony Music Entertainment. This new and free music service run by advertising released last March, and allows Chinese Internet users to download and stream music in China. Google boasts a rise in the fourth quarter of last year to 35.6%, from half just three years prior according to Beijing-based research firm Analysys International. Despite Google’s large success, it still remains a distant second to it’s Chinese competitor Baidu Inc. Baidu gloated a 58.4% market share in the latest period. Nevertheless, Google continues to be the most successful foreign Internet company in China. 

Google’s declaration has received no response from the Chinese government. The Chinese media has also remained mostly silent on the matter with some journalists reporting that the issues of censorship and cyber eavesdropping is too delicate to touch upon. One report by China’s state-run Xinhua news agency cited an official from China’s State Council Information Office saying authorities were seeking more information on the Google statement. Regardless, Google’s Chinese Web site continues to be filtered with a message warning users of the filtration at the bottom of its Web pages.