Chinese internet users report that a two-week blockage on the internet search service Google has been at least partly relaxed following widespread international protest and efforts to beat the restrictions.
The Chinese government refutes denying access to Google and has suggested that surfers could be suffering normal network problems. But outside observers suspect that the notorious 鈥淕reat Firewall of China鈥� is still blocking the site.
鈥淚t is quite normal with some internet sites that sometimes you can access them, and sometimes you can鈥檛,鈥� says an official from the Chinese government鈥檚 information department. 鈥淭he ministry has received no information about Google being blocked, and we have received no information about a block being lifted,鈥�
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But Yaman Akdeniz, director of the UK鈥檚 Cyber Rights & Cyber Liberties, told New Scientist: 鈥淚t鈥檚 well known that the Chinese government blocks access to certain web sites. I never thought they鈥檇 be foolish enough to block high profile search engines.鈥�
China鈥檚 45 million internet users can only access the web through government-run ISPs. This means that access to any site that hosts unacceptable content can easily be blocked. Sites affected include the BBC鈥檚 news service and the Altavista search engine.
Mirrors and proxies
Internet users in China report that Google can now be accessed. But an online service run by researchers at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School that can be used to remotely test China鈥檚 internet restrictions shows that Google is still inaccessible some of the time.
Over the two weeks that the site has been inaccessible some visitors inside China have been directed to other Chinese search engines. The apparent partial relaxation of the ban comes after protests from human rights groups and other organisations.
Many internet users have also drawn attention to web mirrors and proxies servers that can be used to gain access to Google and other restricted web sites from within China.
Web mirrors host restricted content at a different address on the internet, sidestepping a blocked address. Proxies situated outside China are sites not blocked by the government which take requests for content and then serve the pages directly to the user.