Google ex-CEO Eric Schmidt defends the firm's plans to create a censored Chinese search engine saying it will help the country 'be more open'

  • The intended search engine was heavily criticised when it was revealed last year
  • While not involved in the project, Mr Schmidt claimed plans were transparent
  • He added that Google would have been better not to have left China in 2010
  • Mr Schmidt also defended Google's handling of its tax affairs as rule-compliant 

Google's plans in China — which once included a Government-censored search engine — will make the country more open, claimed the firm's ex-CEO, Eric Schmidt.

The businessman, 64, presented a comprehensive defence of the tech company's operations in China during an interview with BBC's Newsnight on Monday.

Mr Schmidt also defended the manner in which Google handles its tax affairs, which is both ethical and compliant with all regulations, he said.

The firm has recently hired a Dutch company to help minimise its tax obligations and has transferred €19.9 billion (£17.3 billion/$22.3 billion) into a tax haven.

Scroll down for video 

Google's plans for China — which once included a Government-censored search engine — will make the country more open, claimed the firm's ex-CEO, Eric Schmidt (pictured), on Monday

Google's plans for China — which once included a Government-censored search engine — will make the country more open, claimed the firm's ex-CEO, Eric Schmidt (pictured), on Monday

Mr Schmidt, 64, defended the nature of Google's operations in China during an interview with BBC's Newsnight programme on May 13, 2019.

The company relocated its China-based operations to Hong Kong in 2010, following the discovery that it — and the Gmail accounts of various local human-rights activists — had been subjected to cyber-attacks by Beijing.

When the tech firm relocated, it also closed down its Google.cn search engine service, redirecting users to its Google.hk site, hosted in Hong Kong, instead.

Google.hk provides an uncensored search service, unlike Google.cn, which adhered to Chinese censorship rules by blacklisting certain search results.

According to Mr Schmidt, he had thought that this relocation was a mistake.

'I believed they would be better to stay in China, and help change China to be more open,' he said.

In this vein, the last year has seen Google renew its interest in the both Chinese market and establishing a presence in the county — efforts which have included setting up 700 China-based employees working on local advertising and development.

And just last year, the New York Times and the Intercept reported that Google was working on a new search engine for use in China, dubbed 'Dragonfly'.

Like Google.cn, Dragonfly would have complied with China's censorship rules — but, unlike its predecessor, would not tell users when search results had been barred.

This censoring includes allowing the Chinese authorities to prohibit certain search terms as well as controlling certain data — such as those relating to air quality.

Blacklisted phrases would have included the Mandarin expressions for 'human rights', 'student protest' and 'Nobel prize'. 

The Dragonfly project attracted criticism both internally and externally.

More than 1,400 Google employees signed an internal petition condemning the lack of transparency around the planned search engine.

Following the backlash and a number of prominent resignations in response to the revelation, Google announced that it was no longer working on the project.

Last year, the New York Times and the Intercept reported that Google was discreetly working on a search engine for use in China that would comply with Beijing’s strict censorship rules. The plans were met with protest, such as the one pictured above, outside Google's Madrid HQ

Last year, the New York Times and the Intercept reported that Google was discreetly working on a search engine for use in China that would comply with Beijing’s strict censorship rules. The plans were met with protest, such as the one pictured above, outside Google's Madrid HQ

When asked why employees only heard about the project in the media, Mr Schmidt said he had no direct involvement in the work.

'I can tell you that, certainly, the people who were building all these products knew about it,' he said.

However, an unnamed Google employee with knowledge of the Dragonfly project told The Intercept that this was not the case.

'Probably 90 percent of engineers [in Google’s search department] had no idea [about Project Dragonfly] and were very upset when they learned that their work was contributing to this,' they apparently said. 

WHAT IS GOOGLE'S 'PROJECT DRAGONFLY' SEARCH ENGINE?

'Dragonfly' was a rumoured effort inside Google to develop a search engine for China that would censor certain terms and news outlets, among other things.

Reports claimed the tool ties users' Google searches to their personal phone numbers to help the Chinese government monitor its citizens.

Outside of high-profile leaks, few details have emerged on what the search engine entailed as Google has kept tight-lipped on the project.

A former Google employee warned of the web giant's 'disturbing' plans in a letter sent to the US's senate's commerce committee in August 2018.

Jack Poulson said the proposed Dragonfly website was 'tailored to the censorship and surveillance demands of the Chinese government'.

In his letter he also claimed that discussion of the plans among Google employees had been 'increasingly stifled'.

Mr Poulson was a senior research scientist at Google until he resigned in July 2018 in protest at the Dragonfly proposals.

Advertisement

'The world is a very interconnected place,' Mr Schmidt said.

'There are many, many benefits [for] interacting, among other things, with China.'

This is not a sentiment shared by US officials, however.

Google's work in the country 'indirectly benefits the Chinese military — and creates a challenge for us in maintaining a competitive advantage', chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, General Joseph Dunford, told the BBC.

Such objections were brushed aside by Mr Schmidt, who said: 'That's like saying America makes pencils and pencils are used by the Chinese.' 

In 2017, the firm opened the Google AI China Center in Shanghai, which works to conduct research into the development of artificial intelligence and to recruit local talent in the fields of machine learning techniques.

Mr Schmidt also defended the manner in which Google handles its tax affairs, which is both ethical and compliant with all regulations, he said

Mr Schmidt also defended the manner in which Google handles its tax affairs, which is both ethical and compliant with all regulations, he said

Mr Schmidt served as Google's chairman between 2001 and 2011, after which he became the firm's executive chairman, a role in which he remained until 2015. 

It was during this period that Google's motto was revised from 'Don't be evil' to the new 'Do the right thing'.

At the end of 2017, Mr Schmidt stepped down from his role as the CEO of Alphabet, Google's parent company, although he still sits on the board of the former.

The businessman plans to step down from Alphabet's board in June 2019. 

During the same interview, Mr Schmidt also defended Google's record on tax.

Google employs a Dutch company to help lower its tax bill, a choice which has been met with some criticism. 

'The global tax system is incredibly complicated,' Mr Schmidt said.

'We are required to follow tax rules — when those tax rules change, of course, we will adopt them,' he added.

'But there is a presumption we are doing something wrong here.'

'We were following the global tax regime,' he concluded.

'Would you like us to give more, voluntarily, to these governments?' he asked.

Financial documents filed in the Netherlands have revealed that Google has transferred €19.9 billion (£17.3 billion/$22.3 billion) to a shell company located in the tax haven of Bermuda.

Google has asserted that it adhere to the local tax rules of all of the countries in which it operates its business. 

'We feel very comfortable with what we have done,' Mr Schmidt said, asserting that the firm's tax affairs have been managed ethically.

He added: 'I will defend the company, and how it works, for a very long time.'

WHAT ARE SOME OF GOOGLE'S PAST CONTROVERSIES?

March 2019Google refused to scrap a Saudi government app which lets men track and control women.

The tech giant says that software allowing men to keep tabs on women meets all of its terms and conditions. 

October 2018: A software bug in Google+ meant that the personal information of 'hundreds of thousands' of users was exposed. The issue reportedly affected users on the site between 2015 and March 2018.

The bug allowed app developers to access information like names, email addresses, occupation, gender and more.

Google announced it would be shutting down the Google+ social network permanently, partly as a result of the bug. 

It also announced other security features that meant apps would be required to inform users what data they will have access to. Users have to provide 'explicit permission' in order for them to gain access to it.  

August 2018: A new investigation led by the Associated Press found that some Google apps automatically store time-stamped location data without asking - even when Location History has been paused.

The investigation found that the following functions were enabled by default: 

  • The Maps app storing a snapshot of where the user is when it is open
  • Automatic weather updates on Android phones pinpointing to where the user is each time the forecast is refreshed  
  • Simple searchers, such as 'chocolate chip cookies,' or 'kids science kits,' tagging the user's precise latitude and longitude – accurate to the square foot - and saving it to the Google account

This information was all logged as part of the 'Web and App Activity feature, which does not specifically reference location information in its description.    

July 2018: The EU fined Google $5 Billion in for shutting-out competitors by forcing major phone manufacturers including South Korea's Samsung and China's Huawei to pre-install its search engine and Google Chrome browser by default. 

July 2018: The Wall Street Journal revealed that data privacy practices of Gmail means that it was common for third-party developers to read the contents of users' Gmail messages. 

The comments below have not been moderated.

The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline.

We are no longer accepting comments on this article.