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China is extending the Great Wall into the Internet

October 18, 2007

If China’s recent actions are any indication, the next major war won’t be fought on land, sea, air or space, but instead on the internet.  China’s latest battle is being fought against western search sites (Yahoo and Google).  According to Duncan Riley, China is redirecting visitors to Google Blogsearch to Baidu (a Chinese controlled search engine).  Specifically he explains, ‘new reports have surfaced that would indicate that China has unilaterally blocked all three major search engines in China and is redirecting all requests to Baidu.’  Duncan has previously explained his thoughts on China’s use of their firewall as an economic tool:

war.jpgI’ve written previously on the possibility that China may use its firewall as an economic tool as opposed to a censorship tool alone, and although censorship may be partially behind todays blanket ban of US search sites, the redirect to Baidu would indicate an economic motive; if the Chinese Government were serious about censorship alone we would have reports of page not found/ blocked messages, not redirects to Baidu. The Chinese Government is clearly using its censorship regime to the economic benefit of a Chinese owned (but NASDAQ listed) company. Although the United States Government is a poor WTO member (Antigua anyone) given that China is a recent member the US Government should lodge a complaint with the WTO. China expects free and open access to Western nations but is now not only blocking, but  also redirecting domestic traffic away from Western internet sites that compete with local firms.

Reports from around the world suggest that China is redirecting all Yahoo.com (and sub-sites), YouTube.com, and Live.com to Baidu. 

Written by Alexander Muse · Filed Under Blog 

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