News

Google Plans To Launch Censored Search Engine In China

It’s no secret that China has one of the most strictly censored and monitored internet services in the world. Given that they have over 800,000,000 users though, it’s still clearly quite a lucrative market that many companies from the West want to be a part of. For many years now we have seen many big companies such as Facebook repeatedly try (and fail) to break the great firewall of China. It seems, however, that Google might be set to at least get a foot in the door.

In a report via The Verge, an unnamed insider has reported that Google is preparing to launch a search engine specifically designed for China.

Censorship Included

The regional search engine will reportedly include all of the state censorship which is currently in place. Such a task will clearly be hard work for the search engine provider, if they can successfully manage it though, it could prove to be a massive earner.

Just to put the level of censorship into context, if you were to search in China for things such as Taiwanese or Tibetan independence, you would get no results. Well, at least no relevant results. Similar the 1989 Tianeman Square incident also provides no results. That is just how much the government likes to control the media.

A New Internet Head

The news comes literally just days after China appointed a new head of the internet. This may just be a coincidence, then again, perhaps China might be looking to work with companies. Particularly in instances where money is clearly there to be made.

What do you think? Can Google provide an effective search engine to meet China’s censorship standards? In addition, do you think this is a sign that they might be relaxing their attitude to Western companies? – Let us know in the comments!