This undertaking might not be immediately successful.  The Hong Kong office is only Facebook’s second sales office in Asia (the other’s in Singapore), so companies could need a little while to perform tests and get used to Facebook’s way of doing things.

Of course, it’s also possible that there’s a lot of pent-up demand, and Facebook will do its best to push forward either way.

Blake Chandlee, VP & Commercial Director of Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Emerging Markets at Facebook, said in a statement, "With millions of people in Hong Kong and Taiwan using Facebook daily to connect with the people, brands, and causes they care about, Facebook provides a powerful combination of reach and engagement for advertisers."

Then Chandlee added, "By continuing to build our presence in the region, Facebook will be able to directly provide full support to advertisers here and help them create and execute campaigns that will have a meaningful impact on their businesses."

Facebook already counts several major Asian brands, including 3 Hong Kong and the mobile operation of Hutchison Telecommunications Hong Kong Holdings, among its customers.

In Germany, Google indicated that giving the data to a regulator would itself be against the law.  According to Kevin J. O’Brien, a spokesperson said, "As granting access to payload data creates legal challenges in Germany which we need to review, we are continuing to discuss the appropriate legal and logistical process for making the data available.  We hope, given more time, to be able to resolve this difficult issue."

As for the situation in Hong Kong, Google apparently hasn’t bothered to say anything at all.  Privacy Commissioner Roderick B. Woo said the company let a Monday deadline pass without responding to his request.

Fines and a lot more negative publicity may be in Google’s future as a result.  Many people were suspicious enough at Google’s claim that private WiFi data had been collected by accident; now, the company’s refusal to turn it over doesn’t seem likely to help its reputation.

It’s possible this situation will snowball, too, as other privacy regulators decide to see what all the fuss is about and ask to inspect the data collected in their countries.

After missing her flight to San Francisco, the woman throws a tantrum that was filmed by an employee of the airline Cathay Pacific.

She is seen screaming at the departure gate and then falls to the ground wailing "I want to go! I want to go!" in Cantonese while an older man traveling with her tries to get her on her feet.

"Don’t be so upset, don’t be so emotional," a Cathay Pacific employee is heard saying on the video.

"All passenger doors had already been closed and the crew was preparing the flight for departure," said an airline spokeswoman.

"As the passengers had failed to show up on time, we had already offloaded their checked baggage to comply with the security requirements."

 According to the airline the incident took place earlier this month, and the video found its way to YouTube last week. The video now has over 800,000 views.

The woman in the video has not been identified but Cathay Pacific said it was able to put her on a flight a couple hours later.
 

The report found that 19.2 percent of all Web sites ending in the .hk domain pose some kind of security threat to Internet users. China (.cn) took the second spot with 11 percent.

The most risky generic domain from the 2007 report became more dangerous with 11. 8 percent of all sites ending in .info posing a security threat and is the third most dangerous domain overall. Government Web sites (.gov) remained the safest generic domain name. The most popular domain, .com is the ninth riskiest overall.

Among country domains Romania (.ro) and Russia (.ru) held their positions in the top five most dangerous places with 6.75% and 6% of their Web sites ranked as risky while country domains like Japan (.jp) and Australia (.au) posed little risk.

The report also found the chance of downloading spyware, adware, or viruses from surfing the Web increased 41.5 percent over 2007. Sites which offer downloads such as ringtones and screen savers were found to have an increase in viruses and spyware, up from 3.3 percent last year to 4.7 percent.

"For administrators of top-level domains this study should act as a wake- up call. Last year’s report spurred Tokelau’s domain manager to reexamine its policies," said Jeff Green, Senior Vice President of Product Development & Avert Labs.

"Not all domain managers are as accommodating so our mission is to educate consumers of the dangers and protect them in every way they enjoy the Web whether through their PC, the Web itself, or mobile phone."
 

Hong Kong’s Broadband Is How Fast?

Gizmodo was quick to point out that Verizon will deliver 5 Mbps to customers for $40 per month, and up to 30 Mbps for $180 per month.

But in Hong Kong, according to a City Telecom press release, 5 Mbps isn’t even an option. Or even 10, because they’ve just discontinued their 10 Mbps offering, making the 25 Mbps the entry (basic) package.

How much is that? The release doesn’t say, but if you’d like to try the 100 Mbps service (boy would we!), it’ll about $48.50. Not fast enough? (Huh? Couldn’t fathom that kind of speed.) CTEL can upgrade you to 200 Mbps for $88.

Still too slow?

I know, your mind’s melting, right?

How about 1 Gbps for $215?

So, how do you feel about paying $180 per month for that blistering 30 Mbps now? Yeah, kinda figured. Maybe we should ask for our $200 billion back, eh? 

All of this occurs just as Owain refused to remove the photo or the link to the photo, and was found guilty of violating local decency standards by Hong Kong thought police…er, the Obscene Articles Tribunal.

Interestingly, according to Rebecca MacKinnon, Electronic Frontier Foundation staff photos have also been censored.

Oiwan, already a target for calling on readers to hyperlink to pornographic material in a kind of protest, and thus facing fines up to around $50,000 for doing so, thinks Flickr’s local censorship of the photo is suspicious. From an interview:

Flickr had a new localized policy: from mid-June, the policy was directed specifically at the users in four regions such that the users from those regions will not see some of the photographs. These four regions are Germany, Singapore, South Korea and Hong Kong. This policy went into effect in mid-June. TELA referred my photograph to the Obscene Articles Tribunal on June 22nd. The Obscene Articles Tribunal determined within one week (that is, on June 28th) that the photograph was Category II: Indecent. This was some kind of coincidence — Flickr changed its policy and then the Obscene Articles Tribune received my photograph for classification purposes.

There’s no proof at this point whether there is an actual connection between Flickr’s new "regional censorship" policy and Oiwan’s troublesome outcome. But given Yahoo’s notorious cooperation with speech-oppressive governments in the past, no one would be surprised.

The Unsolicited Electronic Messages Bill currently being proposed by the Hong Kong legislature considers any unsolicited e-mail sent for marketing purposes to be illegal.

It seems pretty straightforward, right?

Under the bill’s current form, however, an invoice sent to a customer featuring a company logo would be against the law.

What about that product recall notice you received via e-mail offering to replace that faulty lithium-ion battery with a new one?

You guessed it, completely criminal under the proposed legislation.

As expected, local business coalitions have wasted little time in expressing their reservations concerning the bill’s intent. The Standard reports that the principal argument brought forth by local companies is that the bill does not take into account any pre-existing business relationships and offers no exception for messages in which marketing purposes are merely incidental.

A key difference between the Hong Kong bill and US anti-spam legislation lies in legal recourse against companies who are in violation of the law. Only Internet service providers and government agencies can initiate legal proceedings against spammers in the United States, whereas any individual can initiate a lawsuit against a company under the Hong Kong bill’s current verbiage.

With the bevy of court cases sure to ensue, the Hong Kong judiciary system may need to enlist the services of Judge Judy to keep up with the legal circus should the bill be passed into law.

Ultimately, this entire scenario brings to light the difficulty associated with developing, and subsequently enforcing, any type of conceivable anti-spam legislation.

A truly hard-line approach is more than likely going to have negative effects on legitimate e-commerce, while a more laissez-faire attitude sends an open invitation to spammers to exploit every potential loophole they can find.

The Hong Kong government will offer its response to the proposed legislation on October 31 to the Bills Committee.

To heighten public awareness that day, I plan to hand out cans of spam to trick-or-treaters.

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Joe is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest ebusiness news.