In the latest development in an ongoing standoff with China over censorship , Google has redirected its Google.cn property to Google.hk, its site in Hong Kong. The move follows reports this morning that Google would announce plans to shut down Chinese operations as early as today. Google first announced that it was considering pulling out of China in January, writing at the time that it would no longer censor search results at the behest of the Chinese government following a set of cyber attacks targeting human rights activists.

According to many reports , the Chinese authorities have temporarily blocked access to the Chinese version of Google Search, Google.cn, as well as Gmail, at 9pm local time. The sites seem to be available again now, but this is a clear sign that even Google is not untouchable any more when it comes to Chinese censorship