China Slams Google

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE55O0EO20090625
Begin quote:
Separately, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk on Wednesday voiced concerns over the "Green Dam" software in a letter to Chinese officials.

"China is putting companies in an untenable position by requiring them, with virtually no public notice, to pre-install software that appears to have broad-based censorship implications and network security issues," Locke said in a statement.

China says the "Green Dam" filtering software is to protect children from illegal images and insists the deadline of July 1 for new computers to be sold with the software will not change.

An official at the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, which handles trade rows, said the ministry had no immediate response to the U.S. criticism and referred questions to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, which also had no comment.

Critics have said the program, sold by Jinhui Computer System Engineering Co, is technically flawed and could be used to spy on users and block sites Beijing considers politically offensive.

The proposed new rules raised fundamental questions regarding the transparency of China's regulatory practices and concerns about compliance with WTO rules, the U.S. officials said.end quote.

Since the "Green Dam" software causes serious security problems and opens up to hacking problems it is obvious that China's main concern is not to stop porn but to control content and thereby monopolize trade and to break WTO agreements for international fair trade. Not only the U.S. but all trading partners with China should be complaining. I hope a new trade war against China doesn't develop because of this. But I think it is fairly obvious that it is unfortunately the most likely outcome.