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September 23, 2005

A troubling bargain to do business in China

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When Yahoo admitted this month to providing information that helped the Chinese government arrest journalist Shi Tao, it stirred questions about the balance between business and human rights. Chinese officials sentenced Shi to ten years in prison for allegedly e-mailing a government document related to the Tiananmen Square crackdown to foreign Web sites. In an article this week, San Francisco Chronicle technology reporter Carrie Kirby reports the lure of China's massive market makes companies like Yahoo and Microsoft complicit with the government's human rights abuses. Kirby says the companies' continued presence in China hinges on their willingness to filter out words like "Dalai Lama" and "democracy".