According to a Bloomberg report, Google has scrapped plans to build and introduce a cloud computing platform tailored for the Chinese market, among other politically contentious countries. The progress grades the second high-profile scheme within Google to develop a product for the Chinese market, after the existence of a concealed Chinese search product, codenamed “Dragonfly,” was disclosed in media reports in 2018 and caused a storm of controversy until it was reportedly shut down by Google in December of that year.
This recent project is internally referred to as “Isolated Region,” and the proposed client was to be countries intent on controlling the data flow within their borders, reports Bloomberg. The goal was to separate this product from Google’s central cloud computing systems and network infrastructure to enable governments or third-party firms to monitor the transmission of data without fear that it would jeopardize the privacy of other Google business clients and individual users in other countries.
It’s unclear whether the product should have been equivalent to G Suite or some other cloud hosting and storage combination. In January 2019, Google decided to temporarily pause the version of the product being tailored to the Chinese market; Bloomberg says the reasons were due to tensions between the US and China over President Trump’s trade war and existing concerns about privacy related to doing business with the Chinese government. The search giant then shifted the project to focus on other African, European, and Middle Eastern countries. But in May of this year, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the proposal was canceled in its entirety, partially due to deteriorating diplomatic ties between the US and other nations, the study notes.
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The project wasn’t just about helping countries that block internet portals or exert oppressive power over the movement of personal devices and web content. For example, Bloomberg reports that the Isolated Region has also been designed to serve European Union countries with strong privacy laws, enabling Google to operate a cloud product in one of those countries by providing a government authority with oversight of data flow and storage.
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The initiative was also intended to help get around U.S. regulations, such as the notorious Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Information Act 2018, which made it easier for businesses like Google to refuse demands from government officials while the data are processed overseas, says Bloomberg.
