NEW YORK - the residents of eight New York prosecuted Baidu Inc. and the People's Republic of China on Wednesday, accusing the engine greater China of conspiring with the Government to the pro-democracy research censor speech.
Violations of claims for continuation of the Constitution of the United States and counsel for the plaintiffs, is the first of its kind. In an unorthodox move, he called not only a business, but also the Chinese Government as defendants.
The trial was filed more than a year after the Declaration of Google Inc. it would censor has more search results in China and rerouted users on its Hong Kong website.
Baidu Kaiser Kuo spokesman refused to comment on.
According to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Baidu acts as an "enforcer" of the policy by the Communist Party in power by censuring such content pro-democracy as references to the Tiananmen Square military crackdown in 1989.
This censorship removes writings and videos of the applicants, who are pro-democracy activists, to the extent the materials do not appear in the results of the research, said the complaint.
It violates U.S. censorship laws affect research here, according to the complaint.
"We support a private company acts as the arm and agent of a foreign State to suppress political speech permeate U.S. is bordered to violate the first amendment," Stephen Preziosi, counsel for the plaintiffs, said in an interview.
PREZIOSI said alleged censorship violates federal and laws of citizenship New York, as well as rights of the rights of New York, on the grounds that "an Internet search engine is a public housing, like a hotel or restaurant".
The prosecution seeks to 16 million in damages, or 2 million by the applicant, but it does not change to the policies of Baidu.
"It would be futile to expect Baidu to change," said Preziosi. The applicants live in Queens, New York and Long Island.
Practices of censorship Chinese Internet are seen as reflecting his belief that maintain a grip tight information helps the Government to maintain control. There are growing concerns in China that the dissent on the Internet could help to destabilize the country.
Research of terms considered sensitive by Chinese censorship is regularly blocked, and the search engines like Baidu voluntarily filter searches.
China also blocks Facebook, Flickr, Twitter and YouTube Google's social networking sites, and President Hu Jintao called for the additional monitoring and "mechanisms to guide public opinion online."
Google actually pulled out of China last spring by redirecting investigations on its search page main language Chinese to a website in Hong Kong, avoiding a direct involvement in censorship by the "great firewall of China".
Renren Inc., which went public on May 4 and runs a social networking site promoted as "Facebook of China", warned that its business could be closed if it does not have to comply with the prohibitions on the content. Which would include a material that could be considered to impair national dignity in China or has been "socially destabilizing."
The Baidu American depositary shares Close up 3 cents Wednesday to $131.84 on the Nasdaq. They are almost four times square since the company went public in 2005.
The case is Zhang et al. v. Baidu.com Inc. et al., Court of U.S. District, Southern District of New York, no. 11-03388.
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