U.S. and China Bicker Over China's 'Great Firewall'
They'll probably find common ground in their support for obscenely wealthy oligarchies.
As China increasingly develops into a burgeoning economic superpower, many of the Chinese government's idiosyncrasies, like political restrictions, artificially devalued currency and abysmal working conditions, have been politely ignored. Which is why it's newsworthy when America finds a reason to be mad at China. It seems the U.S. Government wants China to relax their so-called 'Great Firewall', the notoriously restrictive system of surveillance and censorship officially known as The Golden Shield Project that strictly limits Chinese citizens' activity online. But if you're hoping the U.S. is striking a blow for free speech in Asia, think again - the issue at hand is how the Golden Shield appears to block U.S. companies from doing business with Chinese customers.
On Monday, Michael Punke, U.S. Ambassador to the World Trade Organization sent a letter, obtained by Reuters, to China's WTO representative severely criticizing the firewall. Stating that, thanks to the 'Great Firewall', American and other non-Chinese businesses faced "challenges offering their services to Chinese customers", he suggested that China may possibly be in violation of WTO rules regarding transparency. Among the questions posed in his letter, he asked What are the guidelines and criteria for blocking access to foreign websites? How often are these guidelines and criteria changed or published? Where are these guidelines published? Are they made public in advance of their implementation?" In response, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said "We are willing to work with countries and communicate with them on the development of the Internet and to work together to promote the sound development of the Internet, but we do not accept using the excuse of 'Internet freedom' to interfere in other countries' internal practices."
The interesting thing is that The Golden Shield, using a combination of IP blocking, packet and URL filtering, DNS redirection and connection resetting, strictly limits access to controversial information the government doesn't want publicized. This includes anything mentioning free speech, the Tiananmen Square massacre, Tibetan freedom and other sensitive topics and prevents, among other things, the Chinese language versions of the BBC and Voice of America as well as Twitter and Facebook. While the American complaint doesn't mention specific companies, it's unlikely that a lack of social media penetration is at issue. However, China also has extremely strong protectionist regulations designed to favor Chinese companies over foreign ones. For instance, while most modern video game consoles are manufactured in China, the iQue console, a joint venture between Chinese investors and Nintendo, is the only foreign console allowed to be sold to Chinese customers.
The real issue at hand isn't Chinese restrictions on net freedom, but their tariffs. Punke's even took pains to emphasize that the U.S. was not going after China's restrictions on Free Speech. But the issue of free speech plays better in the media than denied profits, and a challenge to the Great Firewall rather than to China's protectionist policies nicely conflates the two issues.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
-
stereopsis Whether at home or abroad, the US doesn't care about the lack of free speech as long as it doesn't interfere with their bottom line.Reply -
xerroz To me it sounds more like greedy US corporations wanting profits from that slice of the pie and nothing else. Nowadays people could give a crap what happens in other countries, they might pretend they do and will say they do but in reality they could care less.Reply -
elbert Unfair trade practices for this long and US just sends letter. LOL Block trading so company's will have to reopen many production plants here.Reply -
11796pcs CKKwanChina has a Greate Firewall, but US has the longest embargo list in the world!Explain to me why you would want to buy something from North Korea, Myanmar or Somolia please? Sure we have 11 embargoes but they're all on stupid corrupt places.Reply -
slabbo "but we do not accept using the excuse of 'Internet freedom' to interfere in other countries' internal practices."Reply
LOL someone just got schooled! -
andy5174 xerrozTo me it sounds more like greedy US corporations wanting profits from that slice of the pie and nothing else. Nowadays people could give a crap what happens in other countries, they might pretend they do and will say they do but in reality they could care less.+1 There are two more examples showing how hypocritical the U.S. is.Reply
One is the war against Iraq. According to the U.S., they fought for the peace of Middle East, but in fact, they just want to have a tighter grip on the oil market. In addition, although as a country with most (both nuclear and non-nuclear) weapons, they still punished Saddam Hussein for holding weapons of MASS DESTRUCTION in Iraq.
Another is regarding the China-Taiwan issue. If the U.S. were really concerned about Taiwanese's safety, why would they sell Taiwan extremely outdated weapons and fighters at insanely high price instead of advanced ones with merely what those cost? Just watch and see if the U.S. would take any USEFUL action when China intrude Taiwan with the slogan "Saving our Taiwanese fellows from poverty and starvation".
It doesn't bother me if you U.S. strive for your own interests. Which country doesn't?! However, not with the flag of JUSTICE. It will just make others sick of you!