Yahoo Sued for Giving User Information to China

taoman1 wrote with news of a CNN article about a suit brought against Yahoo! for alleged aiding in human rights violations. The World Organization for Human Rights USA has filed suit against the search company for (so the suit claims) assisting in torture by revealing information that led to the arrest of dissidents. "The lawsuit cites federal laws that govern torture and other violations of international law. Plaintiffs included jailed dissident Wang Xiaoning and his wife, Yu Ling, who was visiting San Francisco this week as part of the group's campaign. Sklar said he knew of three other cases, but the dissidents were reluctant to join the complaint for fear of harm to their families living in China. Among those three dissidents is journalist Shi Tao, who was sentenced in 2005 to 10 years in jail."

Comments

Cost of doing business

[Tofystedeth]

in the Ars article they said Yahoo claims that it is simply following local law and that it has no choice but to comply with legal requests from the Chinese government if it wants to keep doing business in that country. If Yahoo had existed during WWII would they have ratted out Jews to Hitler? But I guess it's okay as long as they can turn a dime.

Re:Issues with international companies

[Nasarius]

Then Yahoo simply shouldn't be doing business in China. Yes, it's impossible to conduct ethical business in a country with a horrific human rights record. I don't see why this should come as a surprise to anyone.

This is probably not an issue they thought of when they opened offices in China.

Very funny. Of course they know, they just don't give a shit. That's why they handed over this information. Anything for the sake of making money.