The ‘Eye’ in IT

Security and privacy on the information superhighway

By Deaglan Halligan
From the March 2006 Print Edition

Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo were summoned to appear at the February 16 session of the House of Representatives in light of recent controversy. What is the cause of the quarrel between the government and major Internet companies?

The computer and the Internet have revolutionized the way we exchange information, but they also possess the innate ability to control and manipulate what we see. Upon opening any web browser, there’s a pretty good chance the ubiquitous Google.com search page is the first thing you see. And in another browser window, the inchoate Google.cn is just as easy to find. It’s not some sort of gimmicky knockoff; it’s actually Google’s China portal. Now try entering a well-known bit of Chinese controversy — “Tiananmen,” “Tibet,” “Taiwan,” or even “democracy” will do — and a comparative parallel image search can be run on the portals. The results are illuminating.

Google’s tremendously successful advertising juggernaut relies on technology that filters search results and links from sponsors. Google now employs this same technology in China to facilitate the spread of information — and to abet the strict Chinese censors. With routine technologies having been exported and outsourced for years, it is no surprise that the major IT firms have ambitions in China, which has an irresistible market and almost limitless business opportunities.

China now boasts the world’s second largest Internet population, at 111 million users, and counts more than 64 million broadband users, an increase in more than 50 percent since last year, according to the January 27 edition of The Times of London. Bill Gates speculates that China will become the world’s biggest broadband consumer in the near future.

While Google’s exploits in China are perhaps the most visible, other leading IT firms have tapped into the burgeoning market and have consequently faced fierce criticism. In exchange for rights to deploy their technologies in China’s booming market, Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo, among others, are required to comply with an oppressive regime’s censorship policies, which include blocking Web sites, monitoring blogs, and filtering search engines. As a result, while the uncensored Google.com image search for “Tiananmen” returns the famous picture of a tank bearing down on a peaceful student protester, the sanitized Google.cn image search returns colorful flowers and smiling faces.

While it is easy to feel distant from Chinese politics, perhaps Americans would find it much more difficult to tolerate this data manipulation and control of information at home.

In addition to its February 16 appointment in Washington, Google scheduled an engagement for February 27 in San Jose with the Justice Department. As a matter of fact, Google is the only company in a group including Microsoft, Yahoo, and America Online to fight the Justice Department’s demand for “random” records of one million web addresses and one million search queries.

While moralists may extol the Justice Department’s mission to utilize this information to defend the Child Online Protection Act and bar explicit content on some Web sites, many citizens decry it as an egregious invasion of privacy. The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s lawsuit against AT&T, alleging that the company has willingly opened its extensive 300 terabyte database to the NSA and has performed illegal wiretaps, does nothing to ease the minds of critics. In the midst of the War on Terror, Americans are increasingly concerned both with national security and with maintaining personal freedoms in the face of ballooning and intrusive government agencies. IT companies, the eyes and ears in the revolutionized media world, are once again caught in the middle of the fray.

These two actions — data distortion in China and privacy violations in America — speak to an uneasy triangular relationship among government, corporations, and citizens. While nations and businesses make deals, the clients and subjects of those institutions have no voice.

Although the American and Chinese governments clearly have different objectives, the effect is the same for the user. Private, sensitive information is obscured in China because it is considered dangerous, and acquired in the United States for political use. Furthermore, there is an undeniable, distinctly uncomfortable breach of trust between government and citizen, a violation of the sacred space that makes the individual feel free.

Whether the reason for information alteration is global economics or national security, it is tempting for companies to throw caution to the wind, sacrifice principle, and go for the gold. Proponents of current economic policies in China argue that that country has made strides in welcoming the free market, and proponents of wiretapping invoke the necessity of national defense and control of online content.

As relevant as these arguments may be, they inherently disregard the individual freedom of millions of people. It is difficult to come to terms with the fact that, while American soldiers make sacrifices to bring freedom to the Iraqis, American companies withhold freedom from the Chinese, and American government agencies eavesdrop with technology.

Google is in a unique position in that it has stood up to protect its users’ privacy in America, but has irrationally sold the Chinese people short. Large corporations clearly face moral dilemmas. Although modern international companies may see themselves as entities without borders, their actions influence governments and the people living under them. In the future, American individuals, agencies, and corporations must conduct themselves with progressive integrity that also reflects an uncompromising assertion of American ideals.

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