A Chinese Internet user browses for information on the popular search engine Google. Photograph: Reuters/Corbis

Google announced today that it would stop  sensoring search results in China following a hack attempt the company said appeared to be aimed at gathering information on human rights activists.

On its own blog, the company stated “We have taken the unusual step of sharing information about these attacks with a broad audience not just because of the security and human rights implications of what we have unearthed, but also because this information goes to the heart of a much bigger global debate about freedom of speech.”

Great news. A little late and after some bad business, but a step in the right direction, none the less. Maybe only Nixon could go to China.

While google says it will be discussing with China how it will be able to allow unfiltered results into the country from here on out, it seems clear that the government has no intentions of allowing the free flow of informaton to continue without attempts to track who is accessing it. Google should immediately unfilter results and move its offices out of the country, and then more safely promote unfettered web access by channeling some of their incredibly smart staff’s efforts toward projects that protect privacy in China and help more websurfers there quickly and safely bypass firewalls.