Google announced that it encrypts searches in China to evade government censorship, reported the Washington Post on Thursday.
"The revelations of this past summer underscored our need to strengthen our networks. Among the many improvements we've made in recent months is to encrypt Google Search by default around the world," said spokeswoman Niki Christoff, referring to the Snowden leaks, in an e-mailed statement to the Washington Post.
Google stated that the move is part of its global expansion of "privacy technology" to protect its users from government and other kinds of censorship, the Washington Post reported.
Forbes said that China's massive censorship program, referred to as to the Great Firewall, censors searches with sensitive terms. Google's move comes on the heels of Snowden's speech at last week's SXSW gathering, where he mentioned that companies should offer end-to-end encryption.
While security experts believe that the government can block user access to Google, they also said that officials are likely to intercept searches at the user end before Google's servers get the queries.
Google's market share in China stands is a minuscule 1.4 percent as most users use home-grown Baidu, after Google pulled out of China in 2010, according to Forbes. The new encryption security measures may not apply in the small community of Google users as many of them continue to use old browser versions that cannot support the security feature.
Liberty Voice said that encryption could also protect users from NSA snooping. Talking about Snowden's speech at SXSW it said, "Snowden speaks through 7 proxy servers, and delayed video, answering questions through Twitter, hashtag #askSnowden. It was discussed that most people will not be taking their own initiative to download apps to protect their privacy, which is why Google and technical developers need to take the step in protecting their users."
