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According to Local Laws and Corporate Policies: Internet Filtering on Google.Cn 2008

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According to Local Laws and Corporate Policies: Internet Filtering on Google.Cn 2008 According to Local Laws and Corporate Policies: Internet Filtering on Google.cn 2008 by Katie Puxley Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Library and Information Studies at Dalhousie University Halifax, Nova Scotia December 2015 © Copyright by Katie Puxley, 2015 For Dave. Amo te. ii Table of Contents List of Tables ...................................................................................................................... v List of Figures ................................................................................................................... vii Abstract ............................................................................................................................ viii List of Abbreviations Used ................................................................................................ ix Glossary .............................................................................................................................. x Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................... xii Introduction ................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Research Statement .............................................................................................. 3 Research Questions ....................................................................................... 3 Research Context .......................................................................................... 4 1.2 Background .......................................................................................................... 6 The Internet in China .................................................................................... 6 Sensitive Matters: Falun Gong and Tibet ................................................... 10 Google in China .......................................................................................... 12 Literature Review........................................................................................ 13 2.1 Removing Sensitive Materials from the Internet ............................................... 18 2.2 Internet Filtering in China .................................................................................. 21 2.3 Circumventing the Censors ................................................................................ 26 2.4 Researching Internet Filtering in China ............................................................. 27 The Google.cn Years 2006-2010 ................................................................ 30 Overblocking............................................................................................... 34 2.5 Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 35 Methodology ............................................................................................... 36 3.1 Keyword Selection ............................................................................................. 36 Variables ..................................................................................................... 37 iii 3.2 Data Collection Instrument ................................................................................ 37 3.3 Procedure ............................................................................................................ 43 Pilot Study ................................................................................................... 43 Volunteer research assistants ...................................................................... 43 Data Collection ........................................................................................... 44 3.4 Data Analysis ..................................................................................................... 46 Results ......................................................................................................... 48 4.1 Frequency of Filtering of Search Results ........................................................... 48 4.2 Consistency of Filtering ..................................................................................... 50 4.3 Frequency of Filtering by Language .................................................................. 53 4.4 What was Filtered? ............................................................................................. 55 Summary of Unique URLs Filtered in Google.cn ...................................... 56 Overblocking............................................................................................... 60 Discussion ................................................................................................... 63 5.1 Research Questions ............................................................................................ 64 Pervasiveness of Filtering ........................................................................... 64 Consistency of Filtering .............................................................................. 66 Language and Filtering ............................................................................... 67 Content Removed and Overblocked ........................................................... 68 5.2 Research Design Issues ...................................................................................... 70 5.3 Contributions ...................................................................................................... 71 5.4 Future Research .................................................................................................. 73 Conclusion .................................................................................................. 74 Appendix A Keywords ................................................................................................ 77 Appendix B Data Collection Screen Shots .................................................................. 83 Appendix C Results Tables ......................................................................................... 86 References ......................................................................................................................... 95 iv List of Tables Table 1 Keyword counts by topic and language ............................................................... 37 Table 2 Variable descriptions ........................................................................................... 37 Table 3 Cochran Q mean values for Chinese keywords search by run ............................ 51 Table 4 Cochran Q mean values for English keywords search by run ............................. 52 Table 5 McNemar mean values for English (EN) and Chinese (ZH) keyword searches by run ..................................................................................................................................... 54 Table 6 Total number of unique URLs by organization and domain from all filtered keyword searches .............................................................................................................. 57 Table 7 Number of unique URLs by organization and domain from filtered Falun Gong keyword searches .............................................................................................................. 59 Table 8 Number unique URLs by organization and domain from filtered Tibet keyword searches ............................................................................................................................. 59 Table 9 Organisations with anti-Falun Gong/Tibet material affected by overblocking ... 60 Table 10 Organisations unrelated materials affected by overblocking ............................. 61 Table 11 Number and percentages of unique URLs that were simultaneously filtered and available in site search results ........................................................................................... 62 Table 12 List of keywords with translation and topic ....................................................... 77 Table 13 Count of always filtered Falun Gong URL site search results grouped by organisation ....................................................................................................................... 86 Table 14 Count of sometimes filtered Falun Gong URL site search results grouped by organisation ....................................................................................................................... 88 Table 15 Count of always filtered Tibet URL site search results grouped by organisation ........................................................................................................................................... 89 v Table 16 Count of sometimes filtered Tibet URL site search results grouped by organisation ....................................................................................................................... 90 Table 17 Count of overblocked anti-Falun Gong/Tibet URLs grouped by organisation and domain............................................................................................................................... 91 Table 18 Count of overblocked unrelated URLs grouped by organisation ...................... 92 Table 19 Overblocked URLs that were simultaneously filtered and available in site search results ...............................................................................................................................
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