Google Is Conducting a Secret 'Performance Review' Of Its Censored China Search Project (theintercept.com) 45
Google executives are conducting a secret internal assessment of work on a censored search engine for China. "A small group of top managers at the internet giant are conducting a 'performance review' of the controversial effort to build the search platform, known as Dragonfly, which was designed to blacklist information about human rights, democracy, religion, and peaceful protest," reports The Intercept. From the report: Performance reviews at Google are undertaken annually to evaluate employees' output and development. They are usually carried out in an open, peer review-style process: Workers grade each other's projects and the results are then assessed by management, who can reward employees with promotion if they are deemed ready to progress at the company. In the case of Dragonfly, however, the peer review aspect has been removed, subverting the normal procedure. In a move described as highly unusual by two Google sources, executives set up a separate group of closed "review committees," comprised of senior managers who had all previously been briefed about the China search engine.
The existence of the Dragonfly review committees has not been disclosed to rank-and-file Google employees, except for the few who have been evaluated by the committees because they worked on China search. Fewer than a dozen top managers at the company are said to be looped in on the review, which has involved studying documents and technical work related to Dragonfly. "Management has decided to commit to keeping this stuff secret," said a source with knowledge of the review. They are "holding any Dragonfly-specific documents out of [employees'] review tools, so that promotion is decided only by a committee that is read in on Dragonfly." Executives likely feared that following the normal, more open performance review process with Dragonfly would have allowed workers across the company to closely scrutinize it, according to two Google sources.
The existence of the Dragonfly review committees has not been disclosed to rank-and-file Google employees, except for the few who have been evaluated by the committees because they worked on China search. Fewer than a dozen top managers at the company are said to be looped in on the review, which has involved studying documents and technical work related to Dragonfly. "Management has decided to commit to keeping this stuff secret," said a source with knowledge of the review. They are "holding any Dragonfly-specific documents out of [employees'] review tools, so that promotion is decided only by a committee that is read in on Dragonfly." Executives likely feared that following the normal, more open performance review process with Dragonfly would have allowed workers across the company to closely scrutinize it, according to two Google sources.
Is this even a story? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Unpopular and immoral but illegal? I can't blame Google for eyeing the world's largest market. If you do business in China you have to follow their laws.
If American companies can't ethically do business in China, then Chinese businesses shouldn't be able to sell in America.
Re: Is this even a story? (Score:2)
Why?
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
No, it's not a story. The performance reviews are for every project. Secret projects are not reviewed by open cross company groups, but instead smaller vetted groups, due to the risk of leaks. This was already true when I worked on a sensitive project there years ago, and I'm sure it's no different for this thing now.
So they intend to pretend it's a good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Even though G knows it's a very very bad idea, and is Evil, they are "analyzing" it, so they can pretend they understand the risks involved.
Which they don't.
They lied (Score:1)
What's funny is that after the backlash from Google employees, Google basically said twice already "We are cancelling this project" but it turns out they aren't cancelling it at all. With such blatant lies I don't see how anyone could still work there.
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They said they have no plans to launch anything. At a big company that does not mean there aren't people working on it. You work on things to see where you get, and launch if the conditions are right. That's the only way big companies can seem to have a fast "response" sometimes to other products or changing landscapes.
If you asked Apple if they have plans to launch a self-driving-car, they'd say "no". But everyone in Silicon Valley knows they are working on it. I've heard from someone familiar with Ap
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Don't throw lying accusations around lightly (Score:1)
Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?
/Ripley
Even if the project was cancelled, they still need to evaluate the people who worked on it...
How well did the ad brand censor? (Score:1)
Taiwan been the real China?
No Tibet.
The history of the Communist party?
The cartoon bear meme?
The 1984 book.
The Animal Farm book?
No talking of the personality cult.
The 1989 Tiananmen Square protests
At a US ad brand all that Communist censorship for China was a universal celebration.
No saying no to full communist censorship at the US ad brand.
Re:How well did the ad brand censor? (Score:4)
Every mention of developing and testing a mass censorship search engine, in China out of the western public eyes, to THEN BE USED IN THE WEST.
Now that's the reality, Chinese in China the off balance sheet test subjects for mass censorship, to then be deployed globally brought to you by the cunts at Google.
It is rapidly becoming an embarrassment to work for Google, now best buddies with Trump and the US War industrial complex, Google helping them to search out all those oppose to US corporate global dominance and KILL the, be proud Googlites, be fucking proud, you can brag to your children how many people your software will silence, either in speech or in life.
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work for an ad company.
Now a purveyor of top quality censorship.
Looks good on a long CV..
Pushed ads past ad blocking browsers.
Worked on a new browser to better push ads.
Fully supported Communist China do better censorship.
Re: How well did the ad brand censor? (Score:3)
Google is already censored in America. Has been for a long time. Welcome to the brave new world.
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Second this. Google's success at censoring what the US sees was so obvious to China that they wanted some of that sweet mindfuck applied their own people.
As requested by the Chinese government (Score:3)
"platform, known as Dragonfly, which was designed to blacklist information about human rights, democracy, religion, and peaceful protest"
Europe, you should remember this and that Chinese companies are state sponsored when deciding whether to support them and purchase and install their telecom equipment in your networks. If you aren't building your own gear it is a given that you are being spied on, to think otherwise is naive. But inviting someone with these kind of values out of spite because you are upset to have what your own intelligence agencies have certainly been aware of and ignoring for decades confirmed is a horrible mistake.
The US has been your strongest ally, we are at war, and you are smuggling resources to the enemy stronghold we've laid siege to instead of joining forces. And why are you stabbing us in the back? Because our President is a loudmouth with a bad tan?
Re:As requested by the Chinese government (Score:4)
So... he made or is making peace with a dictator so you are dumping us for giant anti-democracy ruled by a small council of authoritarians who annex countries like tibet, burn the pacifists alive, and bring in tanks and machine guns when their students protest. Oh and don't forget murder prisoners, preserve the bodies, and send them on a freakish display of how little they value human life around the world.
Yes that makes perfect sense. Why wouldn't you trust those guys? I mean we've got a Churchhill like abrasive loudmouth over here.
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I'm really failing to grasp the big risk. North Korea doesn't represent any particular threat other than blowing wind about Nukes they don't have. All the western nations have peace with a number of dictators, including Putin. There is no particular reason not to make peace with them. They are half way across the world, don't represent any particular threat to us and derive a good chunk of their trade revenue from us despite embargos due to S. Korea proxy deals. Why starve their people instead of making the
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So... (Score:2)
"Of course, the real bonuses won't be tied to how it performs in testing, but rather how many dissidents are actually caught and jailed. And how much spying the US spy agencies can do on China using this, which is why they are probably secretly encouraging it."
The thing is, spying on the dictatorship is a good thing. But is it worth the trade off?
No one cares about Google in China... (Score:2)
...apart from westerners who use Google services and for them it is a right pita. Dragonfly might just result in Google stuff working for once.
Even so, I guess very few Chinese people will use Google since they have native equivalents.
The only effect that preventing dragonfly has is to give some feeling of moral superiority to some Google engineers and maintain the frustration for GMS users in China.