Baidu, China's answer to Google, found itself on the hot seat after government regulators charged the search engine had "improper content" on its online storage service. Files on Baidu Cloud containing pornographic material was found at brought to the attention of China's cyber-authorities. 

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The "Cleaning the Web 2014" campaign, scheduled to end in November, targets all Chinese websites, online advertisements, forum posts as well as smart-phone applications to be porn-free. While some criticize the move as an impingement of free speech and others suspect Chinese officials have way too much time on their hands, the anti-pornography crusade has teeth. Leading portal website Sina.com and online video service provider Qvod both were threatened with the revocation of their operating licenses for disseminating pornographic files earlier this year.  

According to the state-run Xinhua News Agency, the Beijing Cultural Law Enforcement Agency has warned Baidu to do a better job censoring content, bluntly warning "against slack supervision of its service." 

While more of an official wrist-slap, it is enough to make the chicken-littles of the inventment world take note. The anti-porn campaign, starting in April, is one of many government restrictions on China's thriving Internet sector imposed under the pretense of lily-white virtue.

"The Chinese government is ratcheting up its censorship of the Internet," Cyrus Mewawalla, managing director of CM Research, said to Bloomberg News. "The fate of some of the largest Internet companies is more entwined in politics than ever, and that demands investors place higher risk premiums on the sector." 

Analysts assume Baidu, whose history of instant capitulation to the prudes of Beijing has allowed it to achieve superstar stock status and the lion's share of China's lucrative search engine market, will follow through with the demands. 

At the start of the "Cleaning the Web 2014" cyber-sweep, the company posted a anti-pornography slogan/link in red characters on the Baidu Cloud web page. The link leads to a forum warning users an uptick in official surveillance of the site for improper content.

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