China Targets Google

It's all about the porn, allegedly.

China launched a major crackdown on Internet pornography Monday targeting popular online portals and major search engines such as Google.

Seven government agencies will work together on the campaign to "purify the Internet's cultural environment and protect the healthy development of minors," according to an announcement on the government's official Chinese-language Web site, china.com.cn.

Pornography is banned in China, though the government's Internet police struggle to block Web sites based abroad.

The government announcement said Google and Baidu, China's two most heavily used search engines, had failed to take "efficient" measures after receiving notices from the country's Internet watchdog that they were providing links to pornographic material.

The statement also named popular Web portals Sina and Sohu, as well as a number of video sharing sites and online bulletin boards, that it said contain problematic photos, blogs and postings.

It said violators will be severely punished, but did not give details or say how long the campaign will last.

A Google spokeswoman in China, Cui Jin, defended the site's operations, saying it does not contain any pornographic content.

They may as well just ban email, the Internet and computers entirely if they think they're going to rid themselves of online pornography.

Good luck with that.