Hosting In China

China delayed a controversial plan requiring all new computers sold in the country to be equipped with an internet filtering software-Green Dam Youth Escort.

The filter, called Green Dam Youth Escort, was to have been required from 1 July, but the industry ministry said computer makers needed more time.

Its planned rollout sparked widespread disapproval inside China, legal challenges and criticism from overseas. Officials say it is designed to shield children from pornography and violence.

However, many internet users have criticized the software plan as an attempt to tighten the Chinese government’s already strict controls on internet usage. A report by China’s official Xinhua news agency gave no other details on the decision by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

The BBC’s Quentin Sommerville, in Beijing, says the reversal is a very rare and embarrassing climbdown for the Chinese government. Chinese internet users and were furious about this additional control.
Foreign governments have complained that the new software could break trade rules, and concerns have been raised about its effectiveness and safety.
Tests carried out on Green Dam both inside and outside China indicated that it left personal computers open to many different security risks, including virus attacks.

1. Introduction
Greater South China is one of the most economically dynamic regions of the world and one that has significant potential for integrating the Internet in ways that will revolutionize production and distribution. Greater South China includes the Republic of China (Taiwan), Hong Kong, and China’s southern provinces of Guangdong and Fujian. It is useful to analyze Internet diffusion in these four neighboring geographic entities, which are bound together by major economic and cultural ties. Though all four share a Chinese heritage, their similarities diverge in terms of public policies, degree of interaction with the West, and economic capacity. For each of these entities, these similarities and differences help determine the characteristics and the potential of the Internet. The Internet, in turn, has the potential to change the character of each economy and the South China economic network that links them together, tying them into the global marketplace. continue reading »

“You can find everything on Google” but you cannot find google.com in China.

It is ridiculous but it is what is happening here in China.

By the order of Ministry of Information Industry, google.cn start “rectify” its search engine service to so filer “ill” information. Since June 23, google.com was cut off in China, with only google.cn works here. Some of other services, such Gmail is also affected in some areas.

Internet Users:298,000,000
Broadband Users:270,000,000
IPv4 Addresses:181,273,344
Domain Names:16,826,198
WWW Websites:2,878,000
International Bandwidth:640,287 Mbit/s

Data from www.cnnic.cn

1. According to the statistics of China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), by December 31, 2007, the number of Internet users in China has reached up to 210 million, while the number of the broadband Internet users has reached 163 million, accounting for 77.6% of the total. There are totally 11,931,277 domain names in China with 9,001,993 CN names, about 1,503,800 websites, and international bandwidth about 368,927Mbps. continue reading »

Just a few days after its launch, bing.com has been blocked by GFW in China because it doesn’t filer “ill” information for China users. It is not a surprise at all since similar stories has happened a few times for Google.

BEIJING (Reuters) - The number of Internet users in China jumped nearly 42 percent to 298 million by the end of 2008 from the previous year, cementing the country’s position as the world’s largest Internet population, the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) said.

The number of mobile Web surfers surged 113 percent to 117.6 million in 2008 and mobile Internet is expected to grow explosively in the next few years after the recent issuance of third-generation (3G) licenses, the state-run agency said.

The Internet penetration rate in China has risen to 22.6 percent, slightly higher than the world’s average of 21.9 percent, CNNIC said in a report on Tuesday.

In addition, the number of Internet news readers has risen to 2.34 million and websites have become a crucial area for publicity, the report said.

News portals in China, such as Sina Corp and Sohu.com Inc, are the major sources of information for a large number of Internet users across the country.

Wary of threats to its grip on information, Beijing launched a crackdown on “vulgar” Web content this month after conducting numerous censorship efforts targeting pornography, political criticism and web scams in the past.

(Reporting by Michael Wei; Editing by Anshuman Daga)

The Chinese government Denies any involvement in the reported infiltration of US electric grid systems. Xinhua news agency quoted Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu as saying that any sort of involvement from China in the incident “doesn’t exist at all.”

The denial follows a report in the Wall Street Journal which claimed that agents from China and Russia along with several other countries had infiltrated the computer systems charged with managing electricity in the US and left behind software payloads which could be used to control or disable electric grids in the US.

Jiang Yu said at a regular press conference, “We hope that the concerned media will prudently deal with some groundless remarks, especially those concerning accusations against China.”

“I have also noticed that the U.S. White House had denied the media reports,” she said.

A report in the state-run China Daily cited Chinese experts who rejected the so-called “China threat” theory and tied it to the financial crisis.

“Chinese scholars Wednesday rebutted US’s allegations that China was engaged in spying and forging secret nuclear deals with foreign countries, saying these were induced by the perceived ‘China threat’ worrying Washington,” the report said. “U.S. politicians have been debating the country’s foreign and military strategy shifts in the wake of the financial crisis, and some took the opportunity to play up the ‘threat’ posed by China for their own gains, experts in Beijing said.”