RSSYahoo Sued for Aiding Chinese Authorities
By Ed Oswald | Published April 19, 2007, 1:45 PM
Yahoo is finding itself in legal hot water over assisting Chinese authorities in identifying an Internet user accused of writing "subversive" messages about the country's government.
Yu Ling, wife of Wang Xiaoning, sued the company in US District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing Yahoo of violations of Alien Tort Claims Act and the Torture Victims Protection Act.
The complaint says that both were "subjected to grave violations of some of the most universally recognized standards of international law ... for exercising their right of freedom of speech, association, and assembly, at the hands of Defendants through Chinese officials acting under color of law in the People's Republic of China."
Human Rights USA filed the suit on behalf of Yu and Wang, who originally was arrested in September 2002 on subversion charges. Yu has since moved to San Francisco, while her husband remains in a Chinese prison.
Yahoo was first identified by the group as the source of the information in April of last year. This wasn't the first time Yahoo had done so; it was the fourth publicized case of the company handing over information to Chinese authorities.
While it was soundly criticized for doing so, Yahoo has defended itself by saying it was following the laws of the country. Its agreements to operate within China dictate that it must turn over information on those who may be using its services for unlawful purposes.
Immediate comment from Yahoo was not available, although it had expressed displeasure that China was jailing citizens for expressing their personal views.
Blaming Yahoo? or Google which started doing the same. Two years ago I had a complain, and Google answered my email that they will never do the same as Yahoo.
But the problem is not companies only; It is the US government too. The US government supports almost every dictatorship in the world. While the US denies torturing prisoners, it takes them to Egypt to be tortured. Or even supplies the tools and intelligence to countries to torture, like Arab Governments violating all human rights.
Why??
Oil, Oil.
For Google and Yahoo~ Money, Money.
Human rights take the back seat
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|Not a big surprise. Why I stay away from Yahoo.
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|Stinks!A human is a human, no matter what or where he lives.Global compamies is... they don´t give a dam, as long as they make money. I was a student in a technical highschool 1974 so that was when I started use the "net", when the search enginees arived I started with AltaVista, still using it. Works great, no banners, no pop up´s. Put the other s*** away from your computers and take stand for; Human Rights, otherwise you may find it in your own backyard soon enough. Yahoo=Pityfull company.
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|Their laws, their territory, and Yahoo is in their domain so they have to answer to the Chinese government otherwise they loose the 1.4 billion people market.
I agree they shouldn't have done so but trust me there are far worst things US companies are doing overseas. ( haliburton )
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|This will be the only way to change the business tactics of global companies who want to do business in China, and use the excuse of "following their laws" to break human rights. Companies should have to offer China its services with the caveat that they cannot violate human rights, and allow the Chinese government to accept or reject the company, not the other way around.
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|is that how it should work eh? glad you are here to tell us these things. maybe you should become supreme commander also and tell the world how to run it's business? human rights are all well and good in theory but sitting around on your butt complaining about it doesnt help anyone. if the people didnt like their government that bad they would have revolted by now, countless countries have done it over the years, not least of which is france, the usa, england, russia, ireland and many many more. its not some third party companies problem to change how the government is, nor is it other countries problems, it is and always has been solely the problem of the people of said country.
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|So what you're saying is that it's the fault of the Chinese people that the idealistic Revolution they had, having turned into an autocratic communistic iron fist, is the responsibility solely of the Chinese people? It's their fault that their government is terrible?
You, sir, have an awfully narrow view. I'm sure it's one from a Western, Democratic window of the world. It is indeed the responsibility of a company BASED in the USA to comply with USA law - like it or not. That law says what this lawsuit is about.
Shame on you for believing it is the fault of the Chinese people that the Chinese government is totalitarian. Ignorant, ignorant statement.
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|Actually history supports it via numbers. There seems to be more examples of countries internally sucessfully changing their governing body then an another country company(ies).
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|Yahoo is an American company. It should therefore abide by Chinese laws only where those laws don't conflict with American laws. If they do conflict, then it should refuse to comply and if China does not back down, then it should close up shop there, or else move to China and incorporate there. There is no excuse for an American company not abiding by American law.
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|and forfiet all the chinese business?! yeah right, like they will do it. yahoo nor any other big corporation doen't give a deam about other prople lives let alone human rights as long as they make money.
as far as law or morality they will always be able to provide excuse. i'm sure the head yahoo suit sleeps well at night.
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|Neither Yahoo nor Microsoft, or any other large business is going to pass up the potential for huge profits. I think most of us agree it is wrong, but our own FBI has violated U.S laws concerning collection of data on people. The Chinese view these people as subversives and terrorists. We live in a complicated world.
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|WRONG. Yahoo! is considered an international company, with multiple branches, each individual section has to abide by the rules and laws of any country they operate in. peoples opinions on human rights and what a company should do, do not mean s***. when you own a multi-national company maybe you can have the right to tell it how to operate, but, until then your opinion is as useless as steve job's opinion of the world.
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|"WRONG. Yahoo! is considered an international company"
What is the legal definition of an international company?
A company can only be incorporated in one place. Yahoo is an American company, incorporated in America. There might be a subsidiary of Yahoo incorporated in China, but that is not Yahoo, and the lawsuit is against Yahoo.
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|Agreed. This is the price these companies have to pay for doing business in places such as China. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. We need to address international business ethics if we are to be globally competitive and still remain true to our ideals. It's about more than just money. If it wasn't, we'd all be thieves and mercenaries.
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|So a Chinese company here in America would only have to comply with Chinese law and not American law if those laws conflict? Your statement doesn't seem to be thought out well. Any company not obeying the law faces penalties.
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