US judge rules Baidu has First Amendment right to block content

Internet giant Baidu has won the dismissal of a US lawsuit by pro-democracy activists who complained that China's most widely used search engine illegally suppressed political speech.

Eight New York writers and video producers had accused Baidu of creating search-engine algorithms, at the behest of Beijing, to block users in the United States from articles, videos and other information advocating greater democracy in China.

The plaintiffs in the case, which was heard in Manhattan, said this kept Baidu users from seeing their work, unlike users of other search engines such as Google and Microsoft's Bing.

The eight plaintiffs had sought a total of US$16 million in damages for violations of their civil and equal protection rights.

However, US District Judge Jesse Furman concluded that the results produced by Baidu's search engine constituted protected free speech under the US constitution, warranting dismissal of the May 2011 lawsuit.

"The First Amendment protects Baidu's right to advocate for systems of government other than democracy (in China or elsewhere) just as surely as it protects plaintiffs' rights to advocate for democracy," the judge wrote.

Furman likened a search engine's "editorial judgment" to that of a newspaper editor who decides which stories to publish.