https://medium.com/@BlindApp/65-percent-of-google-employees-are-in-favor-of-censored-search-175d26fcc1b5

When Google pulled its search engine out of China in 2010, it gave up the the opportunity to grow in a huge market. The decision to leave was in response to a Chinese cyber attack that targeted U.S. tech companies and Chinese human-rights activists. In light of these incidents, Google was no longer willing to censor searches and become an accomplice to repression.

Flash forward to 2015: Google went through a corporate re-structuring to form Alphabet Inc. and new leaders stepped in to helm the company. Along with these changes came increasing interest to regain access to China’s enormous population of internet users. Last year, Google unveiled plans to open an AI facility in Beijing. In June, Google announced a $550 million investment in JD.com. The Silicon Valley giant is also said to be in talks with Tencent to offer its cloud services. The biggest news came on August 1 when The Intercept reported that Google plans to launch a censored search engine in China, code-named Dragonfly. The final version could be launched as soon as January 2019 and it would mark Google’s formal return to the market that it left nearly a decade ago.