Google offers censored search service in China

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Google Inc. last week said it was launching a search service aimed at users in China that will block them from seeing results deemed likely to offend the Chinese government.

The www.google.cn site will notify users that rejected searches are being blocked because the information being sought is politically sensitive, Google said. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company has been operating a search engine aimed at Chinese users from the U.S. but decided to open a server center inside China in an attempt to speed up searches.

"While removing search results is inconsistent with Google's mission, providing no information -- or a heavily degraded user experience that amounts to no information -- is more inconsistent with our mission," Andrew McLaughlin, Google's senior policy counsel, said in a statement.

Briefly noted