Google Censors Statistical Analytics Service in Cuba

At sunrise today, Cuba’s users were blocked from accessing Google Analytics, as reported this morning by Cubadebate and checked by Juventud Rebelde.

When trying to access the Google Analytics service, used by most digital media and bloggers in the country, from a machine in Cuba, a message appears that refers to the Treasury Department page which enforces the blocking sanctions established by the United States: “We’re unable to grant you access to Google Analytics at this time. The connection established from your current IP address belongs to a country sanctioned by the government of the U.S. For more information: http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/.”

Google Analytics offers powerful statistics to websites and blogs, regardless of their size. As the application’s ad says, “This is one of the most comprehensive web analytics market solutions, and it’s also free.” But not for Cuba.

This is not the only service Google has censored without reason. Also not available to Internet users who connect from Cuba are Google Earth, Google Search and the Google Toolbar Desktop. Nor do we have access to Google Code Search, which supposedly promotes the virtues of free software.

The ban operates extraterritorially. For example, whoever wants to download Google Desktop applications in any country other than the United States is equally unable to do so if the robots detect that the user is connecting from the direction of Cuba, even when a paragraph usually appears in the local services Terms and Conditions, such as the following from the Spanish web: “(These sites) will be regulated and interpreted in accordance with Spanish law and its parties, expressively waiving any other jurisdiction that may correspond, submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of Spanish courts for any dispute or litigation arising under this Agreement, in accordance with the regulations will be of application.”

That would mean that Google’s refusal to offer this program to Cuba is in violation of Spanish law, since there is no longer a limitation between the Caribbean nation and the U.S. that prevents commercial exchange of products. Even so, the penalty is executed with impunity against Cubans.

Nor is this the first time Google has censored Cuban media. On the afternoon of January 11, 2010, facing a complaint from the person who filmed an incident where ex-CIA agent Luis Posada Carriles announced that he would be in Cuba that year and would demand payment for his services, including the recent bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people, Google disabled the site Cubadebate on YouTube soon after.

Announcement Beforehand

It is significant that this arbitrary act against Cuba occurred 48 hours after the announcement that Google had agreed to government requests to block Internet users, according to an analysis released by the very transnational Internet.

The report shows that from July to December 2011, the United States government made 187 requests to remove content from the Internet, compared to 97 from January to June.