A report this past weekend in the Financial Times revealed that discussions between Google and the Chinese government have stalled, as Beijing has refused to compromise on its web filtering policies to keep Google’s search business on the mainland.
According to the FT, a source close to Google believes the company is “ ‘99.9 per cent’ certain” to close down its Google.cn search service, but the same source contends that the search giant will do so cautiously to prevent retribution from local officials against current employees.
A Google spokesperson told Infosecurity that it would not confirm this weekend’s FT report, and that the company had no further comment on the issue at this time.
Since first making the Operation Aurora attack public earlier this year, Google has vowed to re-examine its place in the Chinese search market, even threatening to pull out completely if the Chinese government continues to require censorship of search results. However, the same Google spokesperson confirmed for Infosecurity that there have been no changes to Google.cn filtering since the incidents first came into public view, and the company continues to sort out controversial search results to remain in compliance while talks with the Chinese government are ongoing.