Google [GOOG] has announce that the Chinese government has renewed the ICP license which will allow Google to continue operating in the country. By approving the license it allows Google.cn to continue operating which brings search results to a good number of users in the country.
Getting the country to renew the license was a bit worrying for Google as it needs to abide by local laws to do so. When they stopped censoring results in China back in January it caused a bit of friction which caused users going to google.cn to be redirected to google.com.hk to avoid problems with the government.
From the original post 28 June…
We currently automatically redirect everyone using Google.cn to Google.com.hk, our Hong Kong search engine. This redirect, which offers unfiltered search in simplified Chinese, has been working well for our users and for Google. However, it’s clear from conversations we have had with Chinese government officials that they find the redirect unacceptable”and that if we continue redirecting users our Internet Content Provider license will not be renewed (it’s up for renewal on June 30). Without an ICP license, we can’t operate a commercial website like Google.cn”so Google would effectively go dark in China.
Now that the license has been renewed, it allows Google to carry on operating in China as before. It isn’t clear at the moment if google.cn will carry on redirecting or if something will be worked out with the censored results that need to be in place. We’ll leave them to battle it out! but for now Google is staying there.
Full details at Google.
This is a good day or news for Chinese! Now they can also love or enjoy Google.