When the West Helps China Spy
Fri Sep 23, 2005 17:54
64.140.159.184
keltwarrior69@yahoo.com wrote:
YAHOO SCANDAL
When the West Helps China Spy
By Nils Klawitter
For years, American internet companies have been helping the powers-
that-be in China to spy on their own people. Yahoo is even said to
have exposed a journalist.
AP
The last time Gao Qinsheng saw her son, she hardly recognized him.
She remembered Shi Tao, 37, as a large and powerful man. But all she
saw now was "skin and bones." Gao told prison officials that her son
needed a doctor.
Instead he was transferred to a re-education camp about a week ago.
The camp, officially dubbed a "machine factory," sits on a small
island in Dongting Lake in the southern province of Hunan, where Shi
Tao shares a cell with at least 30 prisoners. If things go poorly for
Shi Tao, this could be his living arrangement for the next ten years.
His crime? Shi Tao, a journalist with financial daily Dangdai Shang
Bao, electronically forwarded an internal Communist Party directive
concerning the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre to
a "foreign hostile element." The document contained little more than
a general warning about the return of certain dissidents. But it was
precisely this word -- dissident -- that was probably picked up by
the state security apparatus' filter programs, focusing the attention
of one of the country's 40,000 internet censors on Shi Tao.
But because the journalist had taken the precaution of sending his e-
mails from an anonymous address, the Chinese authorities had to turn
to Yahoo for help. And the American internet company, through which
Shi Tao had sent his e-mails, apparently had no qualms helping out
the Chinese. According to the organization Reporters without Borders,
Shi Tao could never have been arrested without the servile Americans.
When he was sentenced in April, the People's Court expressly referred
to information "provided" by Yahoo: the journalist's personal account
and the exact transmission time of the incriminating message.
The case became a PR disaster for Yahoo. Only after it was reported
in various newspapers did company spokeswoman Mary Osako issue a
terse statement to the effect that each individual Yahoo office must
operate within the framework of local laws and "customs." Customs?
Does that mean child labor? A little light torture? What exactly does
the word "customs" mean to Yahoo?
Osako also told SPIEGEL that the company, of course, abides by its
own "privacy policy." But that policy is full of holes. As far back
as 2002, Yahoo voluntarily signed a document ominously
titled "Commitment to Self-Discipline for the Chinese Internet
Industry."
Until the Shi Tao case, this meant helping out with censorship as
well as blocking access to certain internet sites to China's
approximately 100 million internet users. Google has also complied
with Chinese policy, and Microsoft's MSN was even willing to remove
search terms like "democracy" and "human rights" from its portal.
According to MSN's model of cultural relativism, this kind of
language is simply "forbidden speech" in China.
But, says Reporters without Borders, Yahoo's latest move has
essentially relegated it to the role of "police informant." The US
company, which had just acquired 40 percent of China's biggest e-
commerce company, Alibaba.com, for $1 billion, had apparently taken
this approach in an effort not to make waves in what it viewed as the
prevailing political landscape.
In taking this approach, though, American companies contradict the
doctrine that opening up markets will encourage political
liberalization.
Journalist Ethan Gutmann has addressed this issue for years. Network
provider Cisco, which has operated in China since the mid-1990s, is
one of the usual suspects in Gutmann's articles. "We firmly believe,"
says company spokesman Ron Piovesan, "that the internet has made
countries all over the world more open."
But Chinese citizens haven't exactly been able to count on Cisco's
help in this respect. Indeed, the company has done exactly the
opposite, says Gutmann, reconfiguring its top-selling firewalls and
routers to meet the Chinese government's censorship needs. In a study
on the internet filtering system in China, the "OpenNet Initiative,"
a research pool of three North American universities, writes that
Cisco products are especially well-suited to helping out the
government's monitoring system.
The devices cost about $20,000, and Gutmann says that Cisco already
sold "several thousand" in 2002. Cisco spokesman Piovesan claims that
the company merely sells network equipment "and is not involved in
government censorship efforts." It's an excuse that sounds a bit like
that of the weapons dealer who steadfastly denies having anything to
do with war.
In 2000, concerned politicians started to raise red flags about the
role of technology transfer in censorship. To address these problems,
they established the US-China Economic and Security Review. At one of
the Commission's meetings, someone asked why trading in censorship-
ready products isn't illegal. The response? "That's a good question."
The issue was quickly forgotten, and nothing has changed since then.
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
How American Government Really Works
Save 25% on "The Crumbling Wall Against Tyranny." Learn the difference between what our founding fathers intended and the freedom eating monster the U.S. government has become today.
http://www.tvweber.com
YAHOO SCANDAL
When the West Helps China Spy
By Nils Klawitter
For years, American internet companies have been helping the powers-
that-be in China to spy on their own people. Yahoo is even said to
have exposed a journalist.
AP
The last time Gao Qinsheng saw her son, she hardly recognized him.
She remembered Shi Tao, 37, as a large and powerful man. But all she
saw now was "skin and bones." Gao told prison officials that her son
needed a doctor.
Instead he was transferred to a re-education camp about a week ago.
The camp, officially dubbed a "machine factory," sits on a small
island in Dongting Lake in the southern province of Hunan, where Shi
Tao shares a cell with at least 30 prisoners. If things go poorly for
Shi Tao, this could be his living arrangement for the next ten years.
His crime? Shi Tao, a journalist with financial daily Dangdai Shang
Bao, electronically forwarded an internal Communist Party directive
concerning the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre to
a "foreign hostile element." The document contained little more than
a general warning about the return of certain dissidents. But it was
precisely this word -- dissident -- that was probably picked up by
the state security apparatus' filter programs, focusing the attention
of one of the country's 40,000 internet censors on Shi Tao.
But because the journalist had taken the precaution of sending his e-
mails from an anonymous address, the Chinese authorities had to turn
to Yahoo for help. And the American internet company, through which
Shi Tao had sent his e-mails, apparently had no qualms helping out
the Chinese. According to the organization Reporters without Borders,
Shi Tao could never have been arrested without the servile Americans.
When he was sentenced in April, the People's Court expressly referred
to information "provided" by Yahoo: the journalist's personal account
and the exact transmission time of the incriminating message.
The case became a PR disaster for Yahoo. Only after it was reported
in various newspapers did company spokeswoman Mary Osako issue a
terse statement to the effect that each individual Yahoo office must
operate within the framework of local laws and "customs." Customs?
Does that mean child labor? A little light torture? What exactly does
the word "customs" mean to Yahoo?
Osako also told SPIEGEL that the company, of course, abides by its
own "privacy policy." But that policy is full of holes. As far back
as 2002, Yahoo voluntarily signed a document ominously
titled "Commitment to Self-Discipline for the Chinese Internet
Industry."
Until the Shi Tao case, this meant helping out with censorship as
well as blocking access to certain internet sites to China's
approximately 100 million internet users. Google has also complied
with Chinese policy, and Microsoft's MSN was even willing to remove
search terms like "democracy" and "human rights" from its portal.
According to MSN's model of cultural relativism, this kind of
language is simply "forbidden speech" in China.
But, says Reporters without Borders, Yahoo's latest move has
essentially relegated it to the role of "police informant." The US
company, which had just acquired 40 percent of China's biggest e-
commerce company, Alibaba.com, for $1 billion, had apparently taken
this approach in an effort not to make waves in what it viewed as the
prevailing political landscape.
In taking this approach, though, American companies contradict the
doctrine that opening up markets will encourage political
liberalization.
Journalist Ethan Gutmann has addressed this issue for years. Network
provider Cisco, which has operated in China since the mid-1990s, is
one of the usual suspects in Gutmann's articles. "We firmly believe,"
says company spokesman Ron Piovesan, "that the internet has made
countries all over the world more open."
But Chinese citizens haven't exactly been able to count on Cisco's
help in this respect. Indeed, the company has done exactly the
opposite, says Gutmann, reconfiguring its top-selling firewalls and
routers to meet the Chinese government's censorship needs. In a study
on the internet filtering system in China, the "OpenNet Initiative,"
a research pool of three North American universities, writes that
Cisco products are especially well-suited to helping out the
government's monitoring system.
The devices cost about $20,000, and Gutmann says that Cisco already
sold "several thousand" in 2002. Cisco spokesman Piovesan claims that
the company merely sells network equipment "and is not involved in
government censorship efforts." It's an excuse that sounds a bit like
that of the weapons dealer who steadfastly denies having anything to
do with war.
In 2000, concerned politicians started to raise red flags about the
role of technology transfer in censorship. To address these problems,
they established the US-China Economic and Security Review. At one of
the Commission's meetings, someone asked why trading in censorship-
ready products isn't illegal. The response? "That's a good question."
The issue was quickly forgotten, and nothing has changed since then.
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
How American Government Really Works
Save 25% on "The Crumbling Wall Against Tyranny." Learn the difference between what our founding fathers intended and the freedom eating monster the U.S. government has become today.
http://www.tvweber.com
Message Board by American Patriot Friends Network [APFN]
