Google Shuts Down China Search, Redirects Users To Hong Kong

Huffington Post   |  Bianca Bosker First Posted: 03-22-10|

After months of speculation over when–and if–Google would leave China, Google has finally made a move: the search engine has officially stopped censoring search results on its China search engine and is redirecting Chinese searches through its Hong Kong server.

As Business Insider notes, ‘Google’s China domain, Google.cn now re-directs to Google.com.hk.’

Google.com.hk includes a note in Chinese that reads ‘???????????????’ (or, loosely translated, ‘Welcome to Google Search in China’s new home’).

Google has posted a blog regarding its approach in China.

Google explains,

So earlier today we stopped censoring our search services–Google Search, Google News, and Google Images–on Google.cn. Users visiting Google.cn are now being redirected to Google.com.hk, where we are offering uncensored search in simplified Chinese, specifically designed for users in mainland China and delivered via our servers in Hong Kong. Users in Hong Kong will continue to receive their existing uncensored, traditional Chinese service, also from Google.com.hk. Due to the increased load on our Hong Kong servers and the complicated nature of these changes, users may see some slowdown in service or find some products temporarily inaccessible as we switch everything over.

Google states that the decision to halt censoring search results and redirect users to Google.com.hk is linked to the cyber-attacks that took place earlier this year: ‘We also made clear that these attacks and the surveillance they uncovered–combined with attempts over the last year to further limit free speech on the web in China including the persistent blocking of websites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google Docs and Blogger–had led us to conclude that we could no longer continue censoring our results on Google.cn,’ Google writes.

Google notes that although the new approach to providing Chinese search is ‘entirely legal and will meaningfully increase access to information for people in China,’ the Chinese government may decide to block access to Google’s Hong Kong-based search.

For this reason, Google has created a site on its App Status Dashboard that will allow people to monitor ‘which Google services are available in China.’

The Associated Press notes that Google will maintain some operations in China:

Google plans to keep its engineering and sales offices in China so it can keep a technological toehold in the country and continue to sell ads for the Chinese-language version of its search engine in the U.S.