The giants of the internet were hauled before Congress yesterday, accused of colluding with China's secret police and censors to wield a "cyber sledgehammer of repression".
In a hearing of the House international relations subcommittee, Yahoo!, Cisco Systems, Microsoft and Google were repeatedly accused of collusion with an oppressive regime, and of selling out the principles of democracy and free speech for profit by bowing to China's demands to censor web content and monitor email.
"Cooperation with tyranny should not be embraced for the sake of profits," said Chris Smith, the Republican chairman of the House subcommittee on global human rights.
The hearings come as Washington is growing restive about Beijing's efforts to control the internet. On Tuesday, the state department launched a taskforce on internet freedom, and Congress members said yesterday they hoped to introduce a bill this week that could restrict the export of technology to China.
In addition, there are moves within Congress and the administration to increase support for technologies such as proxy browsers that would allow internet users in China to circumvent firewalls.
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