Google celebrates China's decision to renew license

The renewal comes six months after the US internet giant angered its host by saying it would end its self-censorship of its Chinese site Google.cn.

Google said it made the move following "a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China".

Since March it has redirected users visiting the Chinese site to its Hong Kong site Google.com.hk, where search results are not censored.

The Chinese Government was unhappy with this situation and could potentially have refused to extend Google's ICP (internet content provider) licence, which was up for renewal on 30 June.

However, a recent concession by Google appears to have mollified the Chinese.

The concession is to put a landing page on Google.cn which features a link to Google.com.hk, putting the decision in the hands of individual users.

The company based its application for the licence renewal on the promise to take all its Chinese users to the landing page within the "next few days", according to Google's chief legal officer David Drummond.

Drummond said: "We are very pleased that the government has renewed our ICP license and we look forward to continuing to provide web search and local products to our users in China."

The Chinese Government has not confirmed the renewal.