The woman to become the EU's top internet official has said she backs Google's threat to quit China over the government's web censorship. "We have to have freedom of speech, we have to have the possibility to put things on the net," Neelie Kroes said.
Google said earlier 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. Ms Kroes said these allegations, if proved, were "particularly worrying as targeting of human rights activists in China and elsewhere" violated fundamental rights such as the freedom of opinion.
Ms Kroes is currently the EU's antitrust commissioner and will likely switch to her new post next month if she receives the backing of the European Parliament later this month. EU lawmakers quizzed her at a three-hour hearing on Thursday.
She called for technology companies to take privacy concerns seriously, saying failure to do so could prevent people from using the internet frequently. Her predecessor threatened to regulate social networking sites like Facebook unless they tightened data storage and privacy standards.
For more: The Press Association: Kroes backs Google China plans
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