Google co-founder Sergey Brin said on Friday he is hoping the Internet powerhouse will find a way to operate in China without censoring Web search results.
“I’m optimistic,” Brin said during an on-stage chat at the TED Conference in Long Beach, California. “I want to find a way to really work within the Chinese system and drive more information.
“A lot of people think I’m naive, and that may be true, but I wouldn’t have started a search engine if I wasn’t naive,” he said smiling.
Brin declined to place odds on the chances of Google working out a compromise that would allow unfettered online searches in China, saying only that while it wasn’t likely to happen now it might “in a year or two.”
He defended Google’s decision to launch a filtered search engine in China in 2006, saying the company’s presence in that market “made a big difference but things started going downhill after the Olympics” there.
The situation “took a turn for the worse” with Web services such as YouTube being blocked, Brin said.
Google vowed a month ago to stop bowing to Internet censors in China in the wake of sophisticated cyberattacks aimed at the US firm’s source code and Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists around the world.
Google continues to filter searches as per Chinese law while trying to negotiate a compromise with officials there.
“We intend to stop censoring,” Brin said. “We don’t want to run a service that is politically censored.”
Google’s investigation showed similar attacks on dozens of other companies, said Brin, who declined to point a finger at the Chinese government.
“It turns out a number of companies were aware of attacks on their systems and didn’t come forward with respect to these security issues,” he said. “If more companies were to come forward with respect to these security issues I think we would all be safer.”
When an apartment comes up for rent in Germany’s big cities, hundreds of prospective tenants often queue down the street to view it, but the acute shortage of affordable housing is getting scant attention ahead of today’s snap general election. “Housing is one of the main problems for people, but nobody talks about it, nobody takes it seriously,” said Andreas Ibel, president of Build Europe, an association representing housing developers. Migration and the sluggish economy top the list of voters’ concerns, but analysts say housing policy fails to break through as returns on investment take time to register, making the
EARLY TALKS: Measures under consideration include convincing allies to match US curbs, further restricting exports of AI chips or GPUs, and blocking Chinese investments US President Donald Trump’s administration is sketching out tougher versions of US semiconductor curbs and pressuring key allies to escalate their restrictions on China’s chip industry, an early indication the new US president plans to expand efforts that began under former US president Joe Biden to limit Beijing’s technological prowess. Trump officials recently met with their Japanese and Dutch counterparts about restricting Tokyo Electron Ltd and ASML Holding NV engineers from maintaining semiconductor gear in China, people familiar with the matter said. The aim, which was also a priority for Biden, is to see key allies match China curbs the US
The popular Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) arbitrage trade might soon see a change in dynamics that could affect the trading of the US listing versus the local one. And for anyone who wants to monetize the elevated premium, Goldman Sachs Group Inc highlights potential trades. A note from the bank’s sales desk published on Friday said that demand for TSMC’s Taipei-traded stock could rise as Taiwan’s regulator is considering an amendment to local exchange-traded funds’ (ETFs) ownership. The changes, which could come in the first half of this year, could push up the current 30 percent single-stock weight limit
NOT TO WORRY: Some people are concerned funds might continue moving out of the country, but the central bank said financial account outflows are not unusual in Taiwan Taiwan’s outbound investments hit a new high last year due to investments made by contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and other major manufacturers to boost global expansion, the central bank said on Thursday. The net increase in outbound investments last year reached a record US$21.05 billion, while the net increase in outbound investments by Taiwanese residents reached a record US$31.98 billion, central bank data showed. Chen Fei-wen (陳斐紋), deputy director of the central bank’s Department of Economic Research, said the increase was largely due to TSMC’s efforts to expand production in the US and Japan. Investments by Vanguard International
RSS