Internet Firms to Defend Policies

I saw this article in the Washington Post (click on the title for the link) the other day and it interested me. Here's the first paragraph:

"Yahoo Inc., Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. will go on Capitol Hill today to defend corporate policies for dealing with China that they say balance business interests with human-rights concerns."

With an opening paragraph like this, you know something evil is brewing (in complete disregard for Google's famed slogan of "Don't be Evil", which, btw, seems to indicate that they set the bar pretty low). It should be pretty obvious that business interests are far more important to these companies than those pesky human-rights concerns. So far it seems like these companies aren't going so far as to murder union leaders, but helping authoritarian and repressive governents repress people is really not a road most morally sound human beings want to travel down.

Apparently, the arguement is that since they're operating there, they have to cooperate with the country's laws, they're actually benefitting the people of China by being there, and they didn't even know what China was going to do with the information. So they're saying that not only do they have to do it, but they are also doing a great service to the citizens of China by disregarding human rights, although they weren't aware that they were doing it. I think it may have more to do with China's wopping 1.3 billion person population and drastically growing market. You can call me cynical, but I was under the impression that money was important to corporations.