After a wait of five days, Internet search services firm Google, Inc., US, continued to be kept uninformed on whether or not its operating licence in China would be renewed, according to media reports. The licence, issued by the Chinese government, is necessary for Google to operate its China-based website, Google.cn. Tensions between the company and Chinese officials have put the licence renewal in doubt.
Google's relations with Beijing have been tense since it announced in January 2010 that it no longer wanted to cooperate with Chinese web filtering following hacking attacks. The company closed its China-based search engine in March and began routing users to its unfiltered Hong Kong site. It recently stopped automatic switching following objections from the Chinese government. Chinese government officials had said that if Google continued redirecting users, the company's Internet Content Provider licence would not be renewed.
Google's web search services have also been partially blocked in China. According to company spokeswoman Jessica Powell, Google Suggest, a feature that provides probable search terms when user types their query, continues to be blocked.
The loss of its Chinese licence is expected to set back Google's efforts to tap into the world's most populous Internet market of nearly 400 million users. Web surfers can still reach the Chinese-language Hong Kong site by typing in its address, but industry analysts predict that web surfers are likely to switch to Chinese competitors such as Baidu.
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