Chinese search engine Baidu won a lawsuit over democracy activists on Thursday.
Eight activists from New York filed a complaint in May 2011 against Baidu accusing the latter of Internet censorship and violation of US laws on free speech. They accused Baidu of illegally suppressing political speech on the search engine from its users in China as well as those from the U.S. who tried to access the site for articles and videos that advocate greater democracy in China.
The activists, identified as writers and video producers, sought $16 million in damages for alleged violation of civil and equal protection rights. They said other search engines such as Bing and Google allows pro-democracy contents.
U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman, however, ruled that Baidu has the right to not allow pro-democracy works to appear from its query results and added that these query results comprised protected free speech under the U.S. Constitution.
"The First Amendment protects Baidu's right to advocate for systems of government other than democracy (in China or elsewhere) just as surely as it protects plaintiffs' rights to advocate for democracy," Judge Furman wrote.
He also equated the editorial judgment of a search engine to that of a newspaper editor who has right to decide the stories to be published.
Baidu refused to comment, but its lead attorney Carey Ramos of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan agreed to the judge's decision. He explained that Baidu and other search engines have the same editorial rights as print publications and can decide to publish or not publish people's writings.
"It shows that our courts protect the right of all media to choose what they publish," Atty. Ramos said in a statement.
"That right extends to Internet media as well as print media. And it protects Chinese media as much as American media," he added.
Even China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei has the same opinion.
"The Chinese government consistently guarantees in accordance with the law Chinese citizens' freedom of speech, and consistently demands that Chinese internet companies strictly enforce relevant Chinese laws and rules," Lei said.
The lawyer of the activists though revealed of an impending appeal from his clients.
"The court has laid out a perfect paradox: That it will allow the suppression of free speech, in the name of free speech," Atty. Stephen Preziosi said.
The activists filed the lawsuit a year after Google withdrew its own search engine out of the Chinese territory following disputes on censorship issues. The Chinese government also blocked YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.
Baidu has been considered as the most-widely-used Internet search engine in China. It has a 61 percent share in the market, based on CNZZ.com's analysis.
