Fergie's Tech Blog

IGF: U.N. Blasts Cisco, Others on China Cooperation

Declan McCullagh writes on C|Net News:

Delegates to a United Nations summit on Tuesday assailed Google, Cisco Systems, Microsoft and Yahoo for cooperating too closely with China, suggesting that new global regulations of free expression might be necessary.

The three-hour session on the second day of the summit returned to long-standing questions that have drawn the attention of human rights workers and the U.S. Congress: Are companies responsible for what customers do with their products? And is it wise to have some international organization adopting regulations governing Internet speech?

Catherine Trautmann, France's former minister of culture and a current Socialist member of the European Parliament, took issue with "market laws that are considered more important than freedom of expression."

posted by Fergie @ 10/31/2006 10:17:00 AM