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Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

theintercept.com

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Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#251

Post by fipple »

reimertz wrote: post #245
fipple wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evil is more banal than that. I have no ostrich jacket but I’d create a spying tool for an authoritarian government for the right price. For me it would be about $5-10 million.

Why?

It would completely set up my family and children for life. I’d get to quit my job and spend all day with my kids. If some people I don’t know get fucked over for that, whatever. And that kind of thinking is why the world is such a wretched place. But I can’t say I wouldn’t jump at the opportunity.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#252

Post by gaius »

int_19h wrote: post #195
srkmno wrote: post #98

Never really understood why Google running a search engine in China is controversial, it wouldn't be the first US company doing business there, nor the first to censor due to local laws (Apple censors their app store etc) and it's not like tiananmen square queries will be the bulk of their traffic.

According to the rumors, Dragonfly goes far beyond censorship, in that it has provisions to identify specific people from search queries. So it's not just that searching for "Tiananmen Square" wouldn't give any useful results, but it'd also let the Big Brother know who was inappropriately curious. Combine this with their upcoming social credit system, and you can easily see how this is proactively helping build an au…

it has provisions to identify specific people from search queries

It associates every query with a phone number, not sure what it does for desktops, street address maybe.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#253

Post by pdm55 »

I don't understand. I used Microsft's Bing when I was living in China. It was very obviously censored. Just type in a "rude" word and you get a message that the search results were blocked. Part of the fun was seeing what risque slang wasn't recognised and, therefore, blocked.

So what compromises are Microsoft prepared to make, but Google isn't?

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#254

Post by cromwellian »

Despegar wrote: post #161
cromwellian wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean, it really happened because a brave Google employee leaked it. If this employee had leaked the same memo to Wikileaks, or the Washington Post, or any other mechanism of widespread dissemination would have been the same. This is like giving credit to Glenn Greenwald instead of Edward Snowden, or Reality Winner, or Chelsea Manning. The real people who take the risks end up in the back, while the reporters end…

If the whistle blowers wanted the prestige there's a way they could have done that: go on-the-record. They chose not to, perhaps fearing retaliation, which is fine. I don't see how that takes away at all from Ryan Gallagher. His stories had multiple sources so it's not like the Edward Snowden situation at all. He got the original scoop, and as far as I can tell, all the follow-up stories as well. And it's not like th…

No one's saying he didn't do any work, but when a whistleblower's memo lands in your lap, it's mana from heaven. Had the memo landed at the Guardian, or WashPo, we'd be complimenting the brilliant work of a reporter there. There are reporters who sift through enormous historical records, conduct undercover investigative interviews, and uncover information that was hard fought, and hard won. That's quite a bit different than following up on a golden goose.

Also, 'going on the record' isn't always an option. In the case of someone like Reality Winner, Chelsea Manning, or Edward Snowden, it would mean life in prison -- or worse if they were in a non-Western democracy.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#255

Post by Antonio123123 »

gaius wrote: post #252
int_19h wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the rumors, Dragonfly goes far beyond censorship, in that it has provisions to identify specific people from search queries. So it's not just that searching for "Tiananmen Square" wouldn't give any useful results, but it'd also let the Big Brother know who was inappropriately curious. Combine this with their upcoming social credit system, and you can easily see how this is proactively helping build an au…

it has provisions to identify specific people from search queries It associates every query with a phone number, not sure what it does for desktops, street address maybe.

I think google.com also associates your queries with you account/location/fingerprint.

I think the issue it that it provides API for the government to process this data.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#256

Post by usepgp »

srkmno wrote: post #200
int_19h wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the rumors, Dragonfly goes far beyond censorship, in that it has provisions to identify specific people from search queries. So it's not just that searching for "Tiananmen Square" wouldn't give any useful results, but it'd also let the Big Brother know who was inappropriately curious. Combine this with their upcoming social credit system, and you can easily see how this is proactively helping build an au…

It's what all companies there are required to do and the Chinese people accept it, and a lot of them welcome the social credit system (according to reporting on the program) it's arrogant to to presume we know what's best for them.

*han Chinese people

the minorities are the ones who will predominantly get the short end of the deal here

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#257

Post by dx034 »

whatshisface wrote: post #160
anonymouzz wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps I'm taking the moral high ground here, but you should contact the media or human rights organizations, spill the beans to help them investigate. Anonymously if necessary.

Which organizations other than Wikileaks have a history of successfully pursuing this stuff?

The Guardian is very active in that space.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#258

Post by pimmen »

fipple wrote: post #251
reimertz wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

It would completely set up my family and children for life. I’d get to quit my job and spend all day with my kids. If some people I don’t know get fucked over for that, whatever. And that kind of thinking is why the world is such a wretched place. But I can’t say I wouldn’t jump at the opportunity.

If one of your kids was disenfranchised by the government in an illegal way (maybe it was denied healthcare, education, protection of the law or something else that's fundamental) but because an engineer was paid 5-10 million you were powerless to stop it would you be as motivated to build something like that too after knowing what the damage feels like?

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#259

Post by sir_bearington »

abc-xyz wrote: post #205
burtonator wrote: post #147

These ethical dilemmas are really confusing for me. One one had I don't want to be part of this type of behavior but it's just going to give China the opportunity to fund a Google competitor to do it for them... I think it's lose/lose for Google.

It really shouldn't be a dilemma unless you're morally bankrupt. Would you sell a gun to a Neo-Nazi that you knew intended to use it to murder innocent people? After all if you refused (and continued to do nothing to stop him) then he would just buy from your competitor.

The fact that you compare China with fascism is it's own can of worms, but even your comparison with selling armaments falls short. China already has search engines, Google wants to sell them a better one. Sure, it'll be censored but there's nothing to indicate Google China would be any more or less censored than Baidu. How does a China with Google become any more dangerous than a China without Google? I suppose better search engines make the country's labor force slightly more productive, which in turn means more tax revenue, some of which may be spent on the military. But if you really subscribe to such a belief, you should boycott all Chinese goods - and I'm going to go out on a limb and doubt you're going to do that.

Re: Google’s Secret China Project “Effectively Ended” After Internal Confrontation

#260

Post by pimmen »

julienreszka wrote: post #217
Lazare wrote: post #214

It's interesting, because if The Intercept is to be believed, Beaumont has basically gone rogue, carving out his own little empire, aggressively preventing other internal teams from figuring out what he's doing, and engaging in behaviour that violates internal Google rules and policies, as well as which opening Google to significant reputational risk. I mean, I'll be the first to admit I have made mistakes in my care…

Google is large enough to not be a monolith culture have you considered this

Then I would expect them to fire Beaumont to at least keep some control over the culture. You can't tell the shareholders "we're too big to know what the hell we're doing, we might be throwing billions of dollars on a project with absolutely no commercial value because it's some executive's pet project all the while the C-level management, the board and the shareholders would be none the wiser. We're a sure thing, by the way, invest in us!"

That's what you're saying as a CEO when you're letting rogue executives do projects that bypasses company guidelines, deceives other managers and costs boat loads in resources and PR without any sort of consequences. Or, you're totally fine with what he did because it's a silent approval if you're a manager and you let unethical behavior go unpunished. Nobody told Mr. Pichai being in charge was going to be easy.

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