Politics and Law

China has indefinitely delayed enforcement of a requirement that PC makers preinstall Green Dam-Youth Escort software that experts believe would have screened not just Internet pornography but also some online political content.

Green Dam allows users to specify categories of sites to block.

(Credit: University of Michigan)

The reprieve, announced by China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, according to reports in The New York Times and the Associated Press, came just one day before the preinstallation rule was to go into effect.

But thus far the reprieve appears temporary: the ministry said the delay will give computer makers more time to comply with the rule, and the government also will continue to equip school and cybercafe computers with the software, according to the New York Times report.

Experts have warned that the Green Dam software poses security risks, and last week, the U.S. Trade Representative protested that Green Dam violates World Trade Organization rules

PC makers had been cagey about their plans to comply with the rule to install the software. Technical and other objections must be weighed against business concerns, and China is a large and growing market. Companies that deal directly with Internet content have been in the hot seat for years, and Google has had to wrestle with new Chinese censorship requirements this month.

Updated at 2:20 p.m. PDT with comments from HP and Lenovo.

The U.S. Trade Representative has written a letter to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce asking that the country drop its requirement that all new PCs sold in China have special filtering software installed.

The letter was sent Tuesday by Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, and expressed concern that the Green Dam-Youth Escort software required to be in all new PCs by July 1 violates World Trade Organization rules.

The Green Dam software is intended to keep children from accessing pornography online, according to the Chinese government, but the U.S., along with some technology companies perceive the requirement as further attempts at censorship as well as a trade barrier.

"China is putting companies in an untenable position by requiring them, with virtually no public notice, to pre-install software that appears to have broad-based censorship implications and network security issues," Locke said in a statement.

In the same statement, Kirk said, "Protecting children from inappropriate content is a legitimate objective, but this is an inappropriate means and is likely to have a broader scope. Mandating technically flawed Green Dam software and denying manufacturers and consumers freedom to select filtering software is an unnecessary and unjustified means to achieve that objective, and poses a serious barrier to trade."

U.S.-based trade associations representing the personal computer industry have already voiced their objections to the Green Dam policy. Dell, which has been ramping up its business in China over the last year, says it has made no decision yet about whether it will comply.

"Along with the rest of the industry, and relevant trade associations, we are reviewing the policy initiative and are working with government officials and others to understand its application," said company spokesperson Jess Blackburn.

Hewlett-Packard, the world's largest manufacturer of PCs, is also taking a wait-and-see approach. "HP is working closely with the trade industry association, ITI, to seek additional information, clarify open questions, and monitor developments on this matter," said a company representative.

Lenovo, the world's fourth-largest PC maker, which is based in China, also said it is still figuring out a plan, but hinted it might be prepared to comply with the Chinese policy.

"We are closely monitoring developments," a company representative said in an e-mail. "Lenovo sells in over 160 countries and in so doing we obey the law and abide by local regulations wherever we do business, and we will continue to do so."

A joint venture of Siemens AG and Nokia Corp., two large European technology firms, is denying reports that Iran uses its Web-monitoring technology to censor and spy on its citizens' online activities.

Nokia Siemens Networks said Monday that it has sold telecommunications systems to the Iranian government but that any built-in monitoring technology was for voice communications and not the Internet.

"The lawful intercept capability is purely for local voice calls," spokesman Ben Roome said in an interview. "We don't know who may have provided other Internet technologies to Iran."

The company's denial comes as protests over Iran's disputed election enter their second week, amplified by Twittering from the Iranian diaspora and cell phone videos showing ongoing street conflicts and the apparent death of young Iranian woman called Neda.

Images and video clips trickling in from the streets of Tehran--even ones whose authenticity may never be established--have electrified the West and demonstrated the limits of power that the government is able to wield. Because foreign correspondents are being pressured by authorities and forced to leave, according to journalist advocacy groups, the country's relatively tiny Internet pipe to the outside world is offering a unique glimpse of the situation on the streets.

Iran's Internet restrictions are no secret, of course. As CNET News reported last week, Web sites including Facebook, YouTube.com, and the BBC have been deemed off-limits by government censors, and there have been recurring reports that Twitter.com and Yahoo Messenger have been blocked as well. Except for some hiccups, though, Iran's Internet authorities have chosen not to pull the plug on the nation's connections to the outside world.

The source of the surveillance technology used by Iran's Internet service providers remains an unresolved political question that could prove an embarrassment for any Western company linked to Tehran's censorial regime. Few technology executives have forgotten the spectacle of Washington politicians calling Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang to a hearing and denouncing him as "spineless" for doing business in China, or Cisco being dubbed as "collaborating with the Chinese government" for supplying Internet switches and routers.

This recent dispute erupted in the form of a front-page article in Monday's editions of The Wall Street Journal, which claimed that the Iranian government has developed "one of the world's most sophisticated mechanisms for controlling and censoring the Internet" with the help of Nokia Siemens Networks. The headline read: "Iran's Web Spying Aided By Western Technology." (In April, the Washington Times published a similar report that also named Nokia Siemens Networks.)

But Roome, the Nokia Siemens Networks spokesman, said that the newspaper's report was incorrect. He said in a blog post, "Unfortunately, I was unable to clarify for the Wall Street Journal the limited scope of the lawful intercept capability (voice calls only) and rule out...deep packet inspection and Web filtering."

Roome argued that, whatever its faults, even Iran's wiretap-ready mobile phone network has proven vital in spreading word about the political upheaval unfolding amid widespread protests. "Mobile networks in Iran, and the subsequent widespread adoption of mobile phones, have allowed Iranians to communicate what they are seeing and hearing with the outside world," he said. "The proof of this is in the widespread awareness of the current situation."

Complicating the matter is the difficulty of identifying the technology used. It's relatively easy to figure out which Web sites that are off-limits--groups like Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet & Society have made a practice of compiling such lists--but much harder to know what hardware or software is being used to monitor Internet links.

"For the filtering work we are able to verify the actual functionality," said Rob Faris, research director for the Berkman Center. "It's just about impossible to document surveillance with the same level of confidence."

In terms of Web blocking, a Berkman Center report compiled in 2005 said that Iran used Secure Computing's SmartFilter. It quoted the company's chief executive, John McNulty, as saying: "We have been made aware of ISPs in Iran making illegal and unauthorized attempts to use of our software. Secure Computing is actively taking steps to stop this illegal use of our products."

McAfee now owns Secure Computing and sells the software as McAfee SmartFilter. A product description boasts of "a proven repository of more than 25 million blockable websites across more than 90 categories."

"We have never seen any direct evidence or hard proof that Iran has ever used any McAfee or Secure Computing product," McAfee said in an e-mailed statement on Monday. "McAfee complies with all export laws and regulation applicable to its products. Rigorous due diligence was conducted prior to the acquisition of Secure Computing and there was no indication of any contract in Iran or support being provided in Iran." (A U.S. economic embargo restricts trade with Iran.)

More recent reports suggest that Iranian Internet providers have developed or adapted their own Web filtering technology, but shed little light on the question of surveillance.

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Compared with a few years ago, traffic analysis and inspection have become more common for Internet providers; their legitimate purposes include detecting malicious activity, prioritizing online phone calls over e-mail, and for mobile providers, charging different fees for different types of data.

Cisco's Service Control Engine series boasts of conducting "deep packet inspection" and "detection and control of virtually any network application, including: Web browsing, multimedia streaming, and peer-to-peer (P2P)." WireShark, free software for intercepting and decoding traffic, can record and display what's taking place on a network. And most modern routers can block or log access to Web sites based on a list of Internet addresses or domain names.

"I don't know how one could actually determine" what Iran is using for surveillance, said Tony Barbagallo, vice president of marketing at WildPackets of Walnut Creek, Calif., which sells Internet monitoring tools including OmniPeek Network Analyzer. "It's pretty easy to conceive that they could be using homegrown technology."

"Our products are used in the United States and elsewhere specifically for lawful intercept," Barbagallo said. "We've actually developed extensions to our products to make it easier to do lawful intercept. Any of our customers with a maintenance contract can download the same products the governments are using."

This echoes the argument that Nokia Siemens Networks has made: that selling voice-only lawful intercept gear to Iran is acceptable because built-in wiretappability is required in the United States and Europe. Ever since the 1994 Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act, U.S. telephone companies have been legally required to make sure their networks can easily be wiretapped by police; in 2006, a federal appeals court upheld the Bush administration's decision to extend those rules to Internet providers.

On the other hand, the United States and Europe tend not to imprison people for criticizing their respective governments, something that responses posted on Nokia Siemens Networks' blog pointed out on Monday. One response asked: "What happens when your 'lawful intercept' capability is sold to regimes which are likely to use it a way which would be considered unlawful under European and U.N. Human Rights conventions -- say to suppress freedom of speech?"

Jay Botelho, WildPackets' director of product management, said the best way for an Iranian Internet provider to monitor its customers would be to use one bank of monitoring equipment for e-mail, another for Web browsing, a third for VoIP calls, and so on. "Using our product, the easiest way to monitor everything is to hook onto an (extra port) port off your main switch," Botelho said. "The problem is that depending on the traffic, that could overload an appliance. But if you slowed everything down, you'd get everything."

That's not a problem in Iran, which has limited connectivity to the outside world, and where download speeds are far slower than what many other countries enjoy. Some Iran watchers have speculated for years that those sluggish connections represented a form of social control--it dramatically curbs Web video usage, for instance--and point to a 2006 decree saying that Internet connections should be limited to 128 Kbps (kilobits per second).

The largest Internet provider in Iran is Tehran-based Pars Online, which claims to employ over 400 people. It claims to have three satellite stations that can send data at 155 Mbps (megabits per second), amounting to the size of the virtual pipe connecting much of Iran to the outside world. By contrast, Verizon's FIOS service offers each home subscriber a connection of 50 Mbps for downloads and 20 Mbps for uploads.

A new generation of Iranians has found ways to bypass the country's notoriously censorial Internet restrictions and disseminate details about Iran's internal turmoil in the wake of the recent election.

In technical circles, at least, Iran is well-known for erecting one of the world's most restrictive Internet blockades, second only to China in its scope. Certain blogs are cordoned off, politically unacceptable keywords are blocked, and Web sites like Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, the BBC, and YouTube remain--at least at the moment--off-limits.

That has complicated the task of distributing videos and e-mail descriptions of the hundreds of thousands of demonstrators marching in the streets to protest the reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Supporters of reformist leader Mir Hossein Mousavi have alleged that the election was a fraud.

But the government's censors have been unable to staunch every data leak. "The bottom line is that a lot of information is still getting out," says Zahir Janmohamed, advocacy director of the Middle East and North Africa for Amnesty International USA.

Some of the online restrictions appeared around the time of the election: that's when Facebook, BBC English (BBC Persia was already blocked), Technorati.com, and YouTube were added to the verboten-in-Iran list. One report says that YouTube's traffic from Iran has dropped by 90 percent in the last few days, and another says that Yahoo Messenger was blocked early Wednesday. Unconfirmed reports from Iran say Twitter.com is also blocked.

One way around the government's online blockades is to find the electronic equivalent of a detour, which involves using something known as a proxy server.

Here's how it works: Normally, a Web browser makes a connection directly to a Web site's Internet address. But that address can be easily discovered and added to the government's blacklist. The trick is to redirect Web browsing through a proxy, which could be a permanent commercial service or someone volunteering his or her computer temporarily.

Then, instead of the relatively easy task of blocking Facebook.com or YouTube.com, the Iranian government has the far more difficult job--in practice, an impossible one--of identifying and blacklisting thousands of individual proxy servers.

In the last few days, Web sites like proxysetupforiran.blogspot.com have sprouted, as have exhortations to engage in a bit of social activism by creating your own proxy server, complete with detailed instructions on how to do it.

Twitter is abuzz with information on how to set up proxies and tips on how to keep addresses known to correspond to Iranian government computers from using them. Other sites have suggested filter-bypassing utilities like a Firefox plug-in that bypasses bans on connecting to Flickr.com or software called FreeAccess Plus that claims to circumvent restrictions on YouTube, MySpace, and some Persian-language sites blocked by Iran.

Using Tor to stay anonymous
Similarly, Iranian usage of the Tor anonymizing network has spiked. "We have seen a doubling of Tor users from IP addresses in Iran over the last few days," says Andrew Lewman, executive director of The Tor Project.

Think of Tor as a far more complex and powerful version of a proxy server; once a computer with the right software installed connects to the Tor network, the rest of the connection becomes very difficult for even government agencies to monitor. Unlike some Web-based anonymizers or proxy servers, Tor can handle instant messaging communications as well.

Tor's public addresses can be blocked, of course, but enterprising individuals can set up private entry points. "You act as a secure relay into the Tor network," Lewman says, referring to private entry points. "From someone watching it, it looks like an SSL session between a browser and a web server, so it doesn't stand out. We look like SSL by design, because who's going to suspect a web browser?" (SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer, the standard method of encrypting Web connections to banks or credit card companies. There have been reports that Iran is blocking SSL too.)

A Web site called iran.whyweprotest.net has recommended Iranians use Tor to cloak their identities and bypass government filters; a related one called TorIR.org offers instructions on how to configure the software for most common Web browsers.

Daniel Calingaert, deputy director of programs at Freedom House, a human rights group, says Iranian authorities have been focused on jamming phones and satellite connections and have not paid as much attention to the Internet.

"They're still focused on cat and mouse games with satellite broadcasting," Calingaert says. "They had jammed BBC Persia, which is probably the most respected and known source of news. And then we've heard that BBC moved to different frequencies. A lot of people are able to get it. It varies based on time of day and neighborhood."

Janmohamed, from Amnesty International USA, says that because SMS text messages are curbed, Iranians have been using the Twitter application on mobile phones as an alternative. And now, he believes, the government has begun to pay attention. "When I look at the pattern of arrests from Saturday to today, initially you had the Mousavi supporters, the Calvin Klein activists--the urban elites--and now you're getting people of all different backgrounds," he says. "They're cracking down on a wider group of people."

According to the OpenNet Initiative, a collaboration of Harvard University, the University of Toronto, the University of Cambridge, and Oxford University, Iran "uses the commercial filtering package SmartFilter--made by the U.S.-based company, Secure Computing--as the primary technical engine of its filtering system."

McAfee now owns Secure Computing and sells the software as McAfee SmartFilter; a product description boasts of "a proven repository of more than 25 million blockable websites across more than 90 categories." (A U.S. economic embargo against Iran prohibits software licensing and the company has said in the past that the software is pirated. McAfee did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. Harvard law professor Jonathan Zittrain, an OpenNet contributor, wrote in a blog post this week that "today Iran runs its own home-grown filtering software.)

Even if Iranians can't always secure a reliable Internet connection to the outside world, they nevertheless have a potent voice: the Iranian and Persian diaspora, amounting to millions of former residents living abroad. It just takes one e-mail message with a video or photo attached for the contents to rocket around the diaspora and eventually end up on a place like TehranBureau.com. In a pinch, a simple phone call to a family member abroad can be transcribed for a Twitter feed.

Freedom House's Calingaert says: "What makes this situation different from others and is driving a lot of it is that you have a very large and vibrant online and blogger community of Iranians outside the country."

"People are really bypassing channels though Facebook and Twitter and contacting their cousins," Amnesty's Janmohamd adds. "You've got one of the largest Iranian diasporas in Los Angeles. Information is getting out there."

Updated 8:14 p.m. PDT: Added more information on Iran's filters.

If the Malaysian government had hoped that the recent detention of controversial blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin would quell the country's vociferous blogger community, it may need to look elsewhere.

Malaysian flag

(Credit: CIA)

Bloggers, civil-rights groups, nongovernment organizations, and politicians from both sides of the camp have stepped out to condemn the detention of the founder and editor of the blocked Malaysia Today news portal. Raja Petra was detained earlier this month for two years under Malaysia's Internal Security Act, which permits detention without trial.

Raja Petra, in addition to Sin Chew Daily newspaper reporter Tan Hoon Cheng and opposition lawmaker Teresa Kok, were arrested September 12. While Kok and Tan were subsequently released, Raja Petra was remanded in a two-year detention at the Kamunting ISA detention center in Perak state. He also faces charges of sedition and criminal defamation for linking Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak and his wife to the murder of a Mongolian woman.

The ISA is a security law, inherited from the British colonial government, specifically to fight against communist terrorists. Civil-rights groups, politicians, and various international bodies have condemned the use of the ISA against bloggers and members of the media.

Zaid Ibrahim, appointed a minister after the March 2008 elections to oversee legal affairs and judicial reform, resigned from the prime minister's cabinet in protest of the arrests.

Galvanizing effect
Various groups and bloggers have been attempting to garner international support against the incarceration of the Malaysia Today editor.

KUALA LUMPUR--The nation's vocal political bloggers and commentators are bracing for a government crackdown, even as Malaysia celebrates its 51st anniversary of independence this weekend.

The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission earlier this week ordered all 19 of the country's Internet service providers to block the controversial political portal Malaysia Today.

According to a report on Thursday by online news portal Malaysiakini, the MCMC chief operating officer, Mohamed Sharil Tarmizi, confirmed that the commission was behind the site blackout. "It is being blocked because we found that some of the comments on the Web site were insensitive, bordering on incitement," Mohamed Sharil said.

Local news reports indicated that users were unable to access Malaysia Today through three major ISPs: TMnet, Maxis, and Time. However, a check by ZDNet Asia on Thursday evening found that the portal could still be accessed through a mirror site.

The MCMC's move is expected to send shockwaves across the IT sector as it appears that the Malaysian government has broken its promise not to censor the Internet--a commitment it first made when the nation launched its Multimedia Super Corridor strategy in 1996. Under the MSC Malaysia 10 Point Bill of Guarantees, the government pledges to "ensure no Internet censorship."

Asked if the move to block Malaysia Today went against this guarantee, Mohamed Sharil said the matter was "subject to interpretation."

"We are governed by the Communications and Multimedia Act (of 1998), which allows us to take preventive measures and advise our license holders (such as ISPs) when a service user may be contravening national laws," he said in the Malaysiakini report.

When contacted, a representative of Mohamed Sharil's office told ZDNet Asia that he was not available for comment, as he was "in Bali."

Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar said the block was justified, as Malaysia Today was publishing offensive content. He told reporters Thursday: "We do not intend to curtail people's freedom or right to express themselves. But when they publish things that are libelous, slanderous, or defamatory, it is natural for the MCMC to act."

"Everyone is subject to the law, even Web sites and blogs," Syed Hamid said, adding that the commission was only exercising its power in ordering the ISPs to block the Web site.

Broken promise not to censor
Malaysia Today's founder and editor, Raja Petra Kamaruddin, called the move a breach of the MSC charter. "The Government has clearly broken its own promise," Raja Petra said in a Thursday report by news daily The Star.

The editor is already facing sedition and defamation charges, after posting reports that linked Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak and his wife to the murder of a Mongolian woman.

Tony Pua, opposition member of parliament and economic adviser to the Democratic Action Party (DAP) secretary general, said the government's move to backtrack on its own guarantee sounded the "death knell" for the MSC.

"As it is, under (Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi) Pak Lah's government, the MSC is already given very little room to grow and very little emphasis on its progress," Pua said in an e-mail interview with ZDNet Asia. "Now it just (sounded) MSC's death knell, and it's doomed for mediocrity."

Regardless of how the government explains the MCMC's directive, he said it all boils down to "censorship with a capital C." "This government has reneged on its pledge not to censor the Internet...(and) does not have any commitment toward freedom of speech. The cyberspace has been of the new frontiers, in which the government has been trying unsuccessfully to control," he said.

"I expect its continued attempts to clamp down on blogs will fail and backfire, and the ultimate victims will be the government's credibility, as well as its various initiatives, such as the MSC," said Pua, a former technopreneur who sold his IT services company to become a full-time politician.

David Wong, chairman of the Association of the Computer and Multimedia Industry Malaysia (Pikom), said the government now needs to spend a lot of effort to convince its population and foreign investors on the "harsh" action taken against Malaysia Today.

"The government would have to explain exactly what major wrongdoings were committed by the Web site," Wong told ZDNet Asia, when asked if potential foreign investors would lose confidence in the Malaysian government over the apparent backtracking on its guarantee not to censor the Web.

If the government is not able to convince the public and overseas investors that it was necessary to block access to Malaysia Today, he said it would be an uphill task for the government to manage any potential fallout.

In a media statement, Salahuddin Hashim, secretary general of the opposition People's Justice Party, warned that this marks "the first step in a comprehensive and reprehensible attempt to curb the access of Malaysians to the Internet."

The Web has in the past few years been "the bastion of freedom" for Malaysians seeking alternative views, Salahuddin said.

When contacted, Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) was not available for comment.

Lee Ming Keong, is a freelance IT writer based in Malaysia, reported for ZDNet Asia.

q&a James Powderly didn't trek from New York City to Beijing during the 2008 Olympics to watch table tennis. The artist was plotting to laser-beam a billboard-size, pro-Tibet message at the Bird's Nest Stadium. Instead, he spent six days locked up and interrogated by Chinese police under conditions he likens to torture. He was joined by other American would-be protestors sentenced to prison without being charged of a crime, then released early following U.S. pressure.

The Graffiti Research Lab co-founder and former engineer has helped pioneer open source, digital graffiti techniques, like L.A.S.E.R. tag projections of words and icons onto public walls, as well as LED bulb "throwies" that stick to surfaces to spell out messages in light.

Originally Powderly was invited to participate in a show at the National Art Museum of China, until he says organizers, fearing political controversy, kicked him out. Instead, he collaborated with Students for a Free Tibet (SFT).

Powderly says his high-tech gear--including a cell phone, green laser, laser printer, laptop, camera, tripods--may have tipped off Chinese authorities. And he suspects that if Twitter stops working in China, you might blame him and his collaborators.

Some protestors were deported from China after this street protest outside the Olympic stadium. The message is made of LED "throwies," lights that stick to surfaces.

(Credit: Students for a Free Tibet)

Q: The last time we were in touch, you'd mentioned the upcoming Green (Chinese) Lantern project, which you didn't detail for obvious reasons. What happened? How did Chinese authorities find out what you were planning to do?
Powderly: When I entered the country on the 15th of August I had a cell phone that might have already been compromised. It had already been used by protesters in the country...We don't know. They weren't telling.

It's safe to say I'm much more like Dr. Strangelove than like James Bond. I stick out like a sore thumb in Beijing. I'm about a foot taller than everybody. I'm wearing a fedora, camos, and sleeveless vest...

These people were still kind of bumbling but resourced and numerically outnumbered adversaries, in terms of the Chinese secret police. There are just so many of them and they're working with so much citizen support, meaning there are 300,000 people in the city just looking constantly and reporting, from taxi drivers to people on the street, undercover cops, policemen in uniforms, soldiers.

Whatever clued them into us, by the afternoon of the 18th I was being tailed by a woman. I spotted her, but I'm in a city of 20 million people. No way they're on me, I hadn't done anything. I was literally at the Wal-Mart superstore buying supplies..I doubted what I was seeing...

Powderly was among the would-be protesters detained in China without being charged of a crime.

(Credit: James Powderly)

What happened next? When did you know for sure? How were you arrested?
Powderly: I spent the day of the 17th scouting locations, buying a new laser printer. I went to kind of a safe house to build this laser stencil thing...They'd snuck a new laser in to me and I'd snuck in LED throwies for the LED banner for another group of activists...

I went to Tiananmen Square to scout that location because we'd planned to do two projection events. If we got away with the first one at the Olympic stadium, then we were gonna do the second one in Tiananmen Square...We were gonna project "Free Tibet" or "Tibet will be free" or "6/4/1989."

What worked and what didn't go forward?
Powderly: None of them worked. We did nothing. We were arrested and detained in China...for doing nothing except for thinking about it.

On the 18th...I did my one and only laser projection that evening out the window on some torn-down buildings...way out in the outskirts of Beijing, literally the last stop of the "One" line...It worked better than any had before, and I'd come up with a new technique for making the stencils to do transparencies with a normal laser printer.

I'd printed out one test message, a little computer inside joke, just the words: "Free Beer." It's a quote from a renowned hacker (Richard Stallman) that refers to free software...

Just days before the Olympic torch will reach Beijing, Internet leaders Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft say they are close to an agreement on a code of conduct for doing business in China and other countries that censor the Internet.

Sen. Dick Durbin on Monday released separate letters from the companies, stating they have "reached agreement on the core components of the principles" of the code, as Google put it.

Those components, the letters say, include principles for promoting freedom of expression and privacy, implementation guidelines, and an accountability framework. The specifics of the code are now being reviewed by the individual organizations involved. Google said the companies are working toward "a set of clear and rigorous principles, such that restrictive governments would be unable to ignore or reject these best practices on freedom of expression and the protection of individual privacy."

"This code of conduct would be one important step toward our shared goals of promoting freedom of expression and protecting the privacy of Internet users around the world," Durbin said in a press release.

The companies began work on the code, in conjunction with human rights groups, privacy advocates, and European companies Vodafone and France Telecom, in January 2007. A year earlier, politicians railed against the companies for complying with China's censorship practices. Yahoo was especially criticized for handing over the identity of journalist Shi Tao to Chinese officials, who sentenced the writer to 10 years in prison.

The impending Olympic games have increased questions about Internet censorship in China, especially after Chinese officials tried to block journalists there for the games from accessing certain sites, even after the Chinese government assured reporters they would have full freedom to search the Internet, unlike its citizens.

Google's letter said that the search giant will not provide the Chinese government with "any sensitive personal information regarding American athletes, journalists, and tourists who use the Internet while they are in China during the Olympics other than required by United States law." According to the Yahoo letter, CEO Jerry Yang personally asked Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to bolster diplomatic efforts in the name of human rights, particularly before the Olympics. (The Microsoft letter is viewable here.)

The letters were addressed to Durbin, Chairman of the Human Rights and the Law Subcommittee, and Sen. Tom Coburn, the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, after the senators inquired in a letter dated July 21 about the progress of the code of conduct. The subcommittee held a hearing on the issue in May.

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