Google Search & Cache Filtering Behind China's Great Firewall

[garyp]

Google Search & Cache Filtering Behind China's Great Firewall
Open Net Initiative
http://www.opennetinitiative.net/bulletins/006/

In a recent interview, the co-founder of Google, Sergey Brin, stated that Google did not negotiate with the Chinese government to have Google unblocked. (5) Brin suggests that 'popular demand' forced the government to enable access to Google. Google is currently accessible to Internet users in China.

However, our tests show that while Google is accessible to Chinese users, not all of its functions are available; because of China's content filtering technologies, users of Google within China experience a much different Google than those outside. As our tests below indicate, China blocks access to the Google cache and to searches that contain certain keywords. (6) Neither China's keyword filtering nor the mechanism used to filter the Google cache is specific to Google. China's usual Internet controls apply when users search for specific keywords in Google: their connection to Google is terminated and they receive no results from their search. Thus, while China's filtering affects Google searches, the system is entirely independent of Google.

Report about how other engines (Yahoo and Gigablast) work in China
http://www.opennetinitiative.net/bul...chengines.html

The fact that other search engines' cache functions are not filtered suggests that China has deliberately targeted Google for filtering.