Originally posted by the Voice of America.
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           China's Baidu Under Investigation Following Student Death

   by VOA News

   Chinese authorities are investigating internet search giant Baidu after
   the death of a college student who accused the search engine of ranking
   search results by the amount advertisers paid, resulting in the receipt
   of misleading medical information.

   While searching for treatments for a rare form of cancer known as
   synovial sarcoma, 21-year-old Wei Zexi found an experimental
   immunotherapy treatment at a Beijing hospital, rather than a
   traditional surgical treatment for his type of cancer.

   Wei, who died last month, paid $30,000 in borrowed money for the
   treatment but it failed, he said in a posting in February on a Chinese
   question-and-answer website. He accused the hospital of overstating the
   therapy's effectiveness and denounced Baidu as "evil" for allegedly
   ranking medical information search results by the amount advertisers
   paid.

   His posting prompted a barrage of criticism over the prioritization of
   paid interne search results.

   Amid mounting public anger, The Cyberspace Administration of China, the
   country's online regulator, said it has launched a joint investigation
   with health and commerce authorities.

   Baidu said in a statement it deeply regretted Wei's death and would
   "fully cooperate" with the investigation. "Baidu is a trusted company
   and we uphold extremely high standards to make our platform safe and
   trustworthy," a company spokesperson said.

   Often viewed as China's version of the U.S. internet mammoth Google,
   Baidu's search services accounted for 83 percent of its total revenue
   last year. Much of the search business came from customers "who pay us
   a fee based on click-throughs for priority placement of their links in
   the search results," the company said in its annual report.

   Some material for this report came from AFP and Reuters.
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   wing-student-death/3313235.html

References

   1. http://www.voanews.com/content/china-baidu-under-investigation-following-student-death/3313235.html