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Tangible Impact of Censorship on Search Engines

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the hands-on-fun dept.

An anonymous reader writes "NetworkWorld is reporting that Indiana University Informatics researchers have created a site that highlights the differences in query results provided by country-specific search engines. cenSEARCHip looks at engines like the versions of Google and Yahoo built to accommodate free-speech restrictions in China, Germany and France."

11 of 110 comments (clear)

  1. Europe needs to commit to human rights by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Europe needs to recognize that free speech means free speech for everyone, especially the loathsome, or it's going to wind up with a problem soon. What exactly kind of message does it send that racial agitation against arabs is being championed and celebrated as a "we must do this to demonstrate we have freedom of speech" kind of thing-- at the same time that search engines are being censored, and people are being arrested for writing books? It says that being a fascist racist is okay in europe, unless you're the wrong kind of fascist racist.

    Is that "European Court of Human Rights" thing just a total paper tiger, or what?

    1. Re:Europe needs to commit to human rights by meringuoid · · Score: 3, Interesting
      racial agitation against arabs ... fascist racist

      I assume you're referring to the cartoons of the prophet Mohammed, published in Jylland-Posten, and later circulated in the Middle-East by some imams trying to whip up an artificial controversy?

      If so, then I have to ask whether you've actually seen them. Here they are. I can't see anything there that's racist. Some are critical of Jylland-Posten itself, referring to the whole thing as a publicity stunt. Some are critical of militant Islam. One - with the schoolboy, whose name apparently happens to be Muhammad - seems quite optimistic about integration and multicultural coexistence.

      The only ones that anyone could conceivably take offence at are the ones criticising Islam or certain sects of Islam. But Islam is not a race, it's a religion, an ideology. Ideologies can never be said to be beyond criticism. Was it racist against Russians to criticise the ideas, the founders, and the results of Communism?

      --
      Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
  2. Just do this... by DarkNemesis618 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just misspell what you're looking for...worked for the Chinese...

    --
    What's the matter, James? No glib remark? No pithy comeback?
  3. A Search Result Falling in the Woods... by klenwell · · Score: 4, Interesting

    with no one around... does it exist?

    I've always been amused by search result comparisons -- especially when they compare total results since most results beyond the first 1000 (as in the case of Google or Yahoo) are inaccessible.

    What's the point, for instance, of Google saying there are 16,000,000 results for your query when they will only show you the first 700? I think this is even true of their API.

    Incidentally, if for some reason you need to quickly find the last known google result, there's always http://www.lastgoogle.com/.

    --
    Innovation makes enemies of all those who prospered under the old regime... -- Machiavelli
  4. Silly by xnot · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Messages are always censored to some degree, becauses ultimately, some system has to decide which messages get through. Either that system is a computer that uses some algorithm, or it's a human who manually decides. Usually it's the popular message that gets through, regardless if the message is accurate or not.

    Ultimately it comes down to your level of trust in whatever system is doing the filtering. What most people don't get is there's almost always some "non-partial" element to messages. News media can't report on messages that the government deems as critical to national security. And now we are finding the same thing with google. And people are suprised?

  5. I'm moving to the free world... by benjjj · · Score: 5, Funny

    China! I got 309,000,000 hits for democracy there, and only 307,000,000 in the US. The only possible explanation is that China is more free than the USA.

  6. Sample Google Searches: China vs. USA by digitaldc · · Score: 3, Informative

    I did a few sample searches on CENSEARCHIP, here were some of the larger discrepancies and interesting results I found:

    ----Compare Google results between China and United States:

    Censor Chinese Internet
    China: About 810,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique) United States: About 7,140,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique)

    Censor Chinese
    China: About 1,790,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique) United States: About 11,700,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique)

    Human Rights
    China: About 879,000,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique) United States: About 878,000,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique)

    Jack Daniel's
    China: About 1,800,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique) United States: About 68,700,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique)

    xxx
    China: About 108,000,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique) United States: About 107,000,000 results (Fetching first 10 unique)

    --
    He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
  7. Re:What about free speech restrictions in the US? by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Not quite free speech, but does google include DMCA blocks on their sites outside the US?

    *Actually, it does.
    I just did a search from google.co.uk (for kazaa lite) and got the following:

      In response to a complaint we received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 2 result(s) from this page. If you wish, you may read the DMCA complaint that caused the removal(s) at ChillingEffects.org.

    Now, since I don't live in America and aren't governed by their rules, why in the hell is that blocked?

    --
    liqbase :: faster than paper
  8. There's always the US. by Valdrax · · Score: 4, Informative

    The reason China was singled out is because of their heavy censoring of politically undesireable facts. France and Germany are listed because of anti-Nazi speech laws. Both countries have successfully sued Google to force them to take down such content.

    Now, try using this search on Google and scroll to the bottom: scientology site:xenu.net

    Woo-hoo! Land of the free!

    --
    If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
  9. More to take into account... by ExE122 · · Score: 5, Informative
    While these results are pretty neat, are they taking into account the fact that search AIs have developed differently? The AI refines the results based on what links people commonly follow when results are returned.

    A search on Tiananmen Square, for example, results in many text references and images of the Chinese government crackdown on protesters in 1989 on the U.S. search site, but mainly hotel and tourist information on the Chinese version

    Case in point. People in China are more likely to want to visit Tiananmen, and therefore would likely click on more links for hotels and tourist attractions. People in the U.s. are less likely to be interested in travelling there, and more likely to look up the history associated with it.

    I looked up "Wyoming" in both Chinese and U.S. googles (not using this site, but actually using google with the Chinese translation of Wyoming). The Chinese site brought up a Wiki entry, a site showing history and demographics, and another page showing its famous landmarks... stuff that people in China might be more interested in. The U.S. site brought up the official Wyoming state government website, the official local travel website, and the University of Wyoming website... stuff that people in the U.S. would be more interested in.

    Looking further down, the chinese site brings up more about history and international travel, while the U.S. site brings up more about hunting, skiing, local state departments, etc.

    I also looked up Tiananmen Square in an image search, and yes, the first couple pages do indeed show nothing of protests. But its not like its completely blocked, the tanks show up a few pages down.

    One thing I noticed in doing my own comparisons is that Censearchip is only showing you the first unique differnces. On some simple searches, those differences don't even show up for a couple pages... the results are more or less the same.

    Now before everyone goes jumping down my back... I'm not arguing that there's no censorship, because I know its a proven point that there is. And I do think that this site is indeed indicative of that. I just think that there is a possibility that some of these measures aren't completely accurate and that there are other factors involved.

    --
    "Man Bites Dog
    Then Bites Self"
    --
    Capitalism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called fascism.
  10. Re:What about free speech restrictions in the US? by Petrushka · · Score: 3, Informative

    The response Google sent to me when I complained about their censoring google.co.nz because of US laws:

    Thank you for writing to us about the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, also known as the DMCA. Google has an established procedure for handling complaints about alleged copyright infringement, which you can review at http://www.google.com/dmca.html. Since Google is an American company, we apply American copyright law to our global properties. Part of our motivation behind this approach is to promote public knowledge and discussion of DMCA notices and removals.

    The e-mail continued with general information about the DMCA. They didn't specifically address the .co.nz (or .co.anywhere_else) question.

    Google.fr, google.de, and google.cn also censor sites on the basis of the DMCA, in addition to censoring on the basis of local laws.