• Reuters, Friday, July 9, 2010 10:40 AM

A week after Google agreed to stop automatically rerouting users to its uncensored Hong Kong-based search page, Chinese authorities have renewed the search giant's Internet Content Provider license. "China has renewed our license," a Google spokeswoman told Reuters on Friday. "We are very pleased that the government has renewed our ICP license and we look forward to continuing to provide Web search and local products to our users in China."

It was feared that China might shut down Google's China search page, which, according to Reuters, "would have been a blow to its other business in the country." Still, while analysts and industry watchers applauded the development, they cautioned that the Chinese government could still cause trouble for Google going forward. "It is good news for the Chinese consumer, good news for the Chinese Internet industry that Google is still available in the country in some shape or form," Ted Dean, president of Beijing-based business advisory firm BDA, tells Reuters. "But many of the issues around why Google shut down its Chinese search page in the first place are still there."

Read the whole story at Reuters »