Today, Beijing East, which is developing a Web site that will match technology experts with Internet users, is one of perhaps 500 or 600 recent home-grown Internet start-ups in Zhongguancun, a chaotic Beijing neighborhood that is both the site of some of the nation's best universities and the Chinese government's designated high-technology industrial zone.
Another security expert said that internet users should not be worried about being unprotected in the meantime.
The efforts made by the NSA and GCHQ against encryption technologies may have negative consequences for all internet users, experts warn.
China's estimated 300 million Internet users, experts say, are awakening to the idea that, even in authoritarian China, they sometimes can fight City Hall.
They along with Internet engineers, cybersecurity experts, legal experts, human rights advocates and thousands of Internet users have called and written to Congress warning of the dangers of this approach, but the legislation's sponsors are undaunted.
But as the number of such third-party "certificate authorities" has proliferated into hundreds spread across the world, it has become increasingly difficult to trust that those who issue the certificates are not misusing them to eavesdrop on the activities of Internet users, the security experts say.
Despite warnings from engineers, security experts, human rights advocates, and many Internet users, many members of Congress initially championed and rushed toward passage this extremely ill-considered bill.
And Zero-Knowledge's chief scientist is Ian Goldberg, a computer expert who is well known among early Internet users for finding security holes in popular software.
But some experts say Google's departure will leave Internet users here with fewer options, making the country's Internet market less competitive and less open.
But as Internet executives beef up security and public attention turns to the F.B.I. pursuit of the culprits, some network experts -- and at least a few lay Internet users -- contend that last week's electronic attacks should sound an alarm.
Online security experts have called for greater efforts to protect internet users, amid rising concerns that adverts on popular websites are being used by criminals as a way to target unsuspecting web users.
