The big three U.S. internet giants (Google, Microsoft, Yahoo) have agreed upon a common set of principles to guide their business in nations such as China that restrict free speech and expression.
Members of the Global Network Initiative, which include both companies and well-known human rights organizations such as Human Rights in China, are quick to point out that the initiative isn’t just a set of rules for doing business in China. Unlike the tabled Global Online Freedom Act that would have made it a crime for U.S. companies to turn over personal information to governments in “Internet-restricting countries,” this voluntary initiative applies to doing business everywhere — and works more as a framework to help Internet companies do the due diligence that can help them avoid the ethical lapses for which they’ve been roundly criticized. (In front of Congress last year, Yahoo’s Chief Executive Jerry Yang apologized to the mother of journalist Shi Tao, who was jailed after a unit of the company handed information about him to Chinese authorities in 2004.)
They know that this will not fix all of the situations. However, the key idea behind this is to start thinking about the problems before they start to get worse.
1 comment:
Really cool that amidst all of the chaos that has been created by some companies overall greed and corruption some other companies are taking it upon themselves to be self regulating. Especially in as sensitive an area as human rights in China.
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