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"SAN FRANCISCO - Google Inc. will stop censoring its search results in China and may pull out of the country completely after discovering that computer hackers had tricked human-rights activists into exposing their e-mail accounts to outsiders. The change of heart announced Tuesday heralds a major shift for the Internet's search leader, which has repeatedly said it will obey Chinese laws requiring some politically and socially sensitive issues to be blocked from search results available in other countries. The acquiescence had outraged free-speech advocates and even some shareholders, who argued Google's cooperation with China violated the company's "don't be evil" motto. The criticism had started to sway Google co-founder Sergey Brin, who openly expressed his misgivings about the company's presence in China. But the tipping point didn't come until Google recently uncovered hacking attacks launched from within China. The apparent goals: breaking into the computers of at least 20 major U.S. companies and gathering personal information about dozens of human rights activists trying to shine a light on China's alleged abuses. Google spokesman Matt Furman declined to say whether the company suspects the Chinese government may have had a hand in the attacks. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the Google allegations "raise very serious concerns and questions" and the U.S. is seeking an explanation from the Chinese government."

"A nonprofit organization devoted to advancing religious liberty for Christians has scoured the news, sought the opinion of its e-mail subscribers and selected a list of "the top 10 incidents of anti-Christian defamation, bigotry and discrimination in the U.S. from last year." "It is arguable that anti-Christian hatred has spilled over into material forms of persecution in 2009," said Gary Cass of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission. "Christians were killed and bullied for their witness, ministers and churches threatened with violence and vandalized for standing for marriage and Christians were fired for not compromising their faith. If these are not bona fide examples of persecution, than I wonder what more it might take?" CADC subscribers chose from a list of 20 stories - both those that made headlines and those that were conspicuously absent from wide media coverage - to pick their top 10. The winners included a wide array of events deemed to insult, injure or marginalize Christianity. They included acts of violence, laws and judgments, actions by schools against students and decisions by the Obama administration to promote causes and leaders at odds with Christian teaching. (Story continues below) Here, then, is the list, as reported by the CADC: 1. "The Federal Hate Crimes Bill that attacks religious liberty and freedom of speech." As WND has reported, Canada's experience with "hate crimes" legislation has caused many American Christians to fear the U.S. will follow a similar path of censoring or even punishing in the name of "hate speech" people who declare the Bible's teachings on homosexuality. Gerald Chipeur is an attorney working to defend a Canadian pastor whose letter to the editor of a local newspaper prompted a complaint, a $5,000 fine and a court order not to express his beliefs further. "

"BEIJING - In China's first official response to Google's threat to leave the country, the government Thursday said foreign Internet companies are welcome but must obey the law and gave no hint of a possible compromise over Web censorship. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu, without mentioning Google by name, said Beijing prohibits e-mail hacking, another issue cited by the company. She was responding to questions about Google at a regular ministry briefing. "China's Internet is open," Jiang said. "China welcomes international Internet enterprises to conduct business in China according to law." Google Inc. said Tuesday it would stop censoring search results in China and might shut down its China-based Google.cn site, citing attempts to break into accounts on its Gmail service used by human rights activists."