Report: Google has deleted a memo on its Chinese search engine

Every time we hear a new report on Google's supposedly censored search engine for China, it seems more damning. Now, The Intercept reports that Google tried – and apparently failed – to delete a memo that could have revealed how this search engine could have allowed the Chinese government to track the citizens who used it.

According to the report, the search engine called Dragonfly would require Chinese citizens to log in to search, their physical location, then share all its data with a Chinese partner company that could possibly share it with the Chinese government. The company would have "one-sided access" to the data. This could also probably include Phone numbers of Chinese citizensas described in a previous Intercept report.

In addition, according to today's report, this Chinese company would be able to add new words to the blacklist of searches to censor.

Here is how Google would try to delete the memo:

Google's human resources staff sent an e-mail to employees suspected of having accessed or saved copies of the memo and ordered them to remove them immediately from their computers. E-mails requiring deletion of the memo contained "pixel trackers" that alerted HR managers when their messages were read, intended recipients.

You may notice a lot of "may" and "could" and "report" in the above paragraphs, since Google still has not confirmed that such a project existed, much less how it could work – all Google has publicly declared is that it is not "close to launching a research product in China", and it should be noted that reports suggest that the search engine is currently a prototype.

Google declined to confirm or reject the report, but here is its current statement to CNET: "We have been investing for many years to help Chinese users develop Android, via mobile apps such as Google Translate and Files Go, and our tools But our research work has been exploratory and we are not about to launch a research product in China. "

At least 1000 employees protested the existence of such a project, according to the New York Times, and The Intercept and Buzzfeed report that some employees resigned in protest. The protest and the resignations resonate those around the Google Project Maven drone project for the US Department of Defense.

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Notably, The Intercept reports that the memo was written by a Google engineer who was asked to work on the Dragonfly project. It is not clear if the employees who initially protested had reason to believe the details alleged above.

While The Intercept's report also discusses the fact that some employees are worried that Google will not hide controversial projects, Google tells CNET that its teams must be able to work on certain projects confidentially, especially at the beginning of their exploration. . shares as much as possible with employees and allows them to give their opinion on most products before their release.

You can find other information on Dragonfly, such as the number of employees working on the project, at The Intercept.

Update, 12:51 PT and 13:26 PT: With the comments of Google.