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Google claims China blocking e-mail
services
OFFLINE:Gmail users in China have been reporting problems
with the service since January. Google has not said if it has raised the issue
with the government
AP, BEIJING
Google said yesterday the Chinese government is interfering with its e-mail
services in China, making it difficult for users to gain access to its Gmail
program.
Google said its engineers have determined there are no technical problems with
the e-mail service or its main Web site.
¡§There is no technical issue on our side; we have checked extensively. This is a
government blockage carefully designed to look like the problem is with Gmail,¡¨
the company said in a brief statement.
BLOCKS
China has some of the world¡¦s strictest Internet controls and blocks many
popular social media sites, including Youtube, Facebook and Twitter.
The government has intensified those efforts after pro-democracy protest erupted
across the Middle East in January.
At about that time, anonymous calls for protesters to gather for a ¡§Jasmine
Revolution¡¨ in China triggered a crackdown by Chinese authorities, who stepped
up Web censorship and deployed huge numbers of police to planned protest sites.
No protests happened.
A Google spokesperson said users in China have reported having intermittent
problems with the service since the end of January.
Problems include difficulty accessing the home page for Gmail and problems
sending e-mails when logged into the service. The instant messaging function is
often not working as well.
SOPHISTICATED
Google officials said the blocking appears to be more sophisticated than other
problems experienced by users in the past because the disruption is not a
complete block.
A company spokesperson refused to say if Google has raised the issue directly
with Chinese government officials.
Google has had highly public run-ins with the Chinese government.
In January last year, Google announced that it would no longer cooperate with
the government¡¦s requirement to censor search results for banned sites.
It also complained about major attacks on its Web site by Chinese hackers,
suggesting the government may have instigated the attacks.
Google moved its Chinese-language search engine to Hong Kong, which operates
under separate rules from the rest of China.
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