Amnesty blows the horn on MS, Sun, Cisco

Human rights group Amnesty International has fingered a handful of tech companies that allegedly have sold products used in government censorship of Internet speech in China.

In a report released Tuesday, Amnesty said 33 people have been detained in recent years for downloading or distributing politically subversive information via the Internet, three of whom died in custody. Many of these detainees are associated with the Falun Gong spiritual movement and with pro-democracy activities.

Web surfers in China have long reported problems in accessing Web sites, sending and receiving e-mail, and using search engines. It is unclear what technology, if any, the Chinese government currently uses to filter content.

Citing news reports, Amnesty named several U.S.-based companies as alleged suppliers of technology used in the Chinese government's crackdown on Internet speech. These included Sun Microsystems, Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Nortel Networks and filtering software supplier Websense.

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