The internet company owned by Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing, yesterday severed ties with Google's search services, sparking concerns that other companies may pull away from the internet giant.
Meanwhile, Google co-founder Sergey Brin urged the US administration to make the censorship row between China and the internet giant a "high priority".
Stressing its adherence to China's laws, Hong Kong-listed TOM Group issued a statement on behalf of subsidiary TOM Online following Google's decision to shut down its Chinese search engine on Monday.
TOM, which runs online and mobile internet services in mainland China, said in a statement it had stopped users from visiting its website through Google's search engine service.
"TOM reiterates that as a Chinese company, we adhere to rules and regulations in China where we operate our businesses."
TOM Group is one of the key elements of the business empire of property tycoon Li Ka-shing, 81, who has strong ties with the Chinese government.
Mr Li was ranked as the 14th wealthiest person in the world by Forbes magazine in March, when his net worth was $21 billion, and he is one of only two Hong Kong-based tycoons to make the top 25 world ranking list.
TOM's announcement came as China's state media slammed Google's decision, saying the US internet giant was "not god" and accusing it of working with US intelligence.
"For Chinese people, Google is not god, and even if it puts on a show of politics and values, it is still not god," said the overseas edition of the official People's Daily, in comments echoed elsewhere in the mainland's media.
"Google is not chaste when it comes to values. Its cooperation and collusion with the US intelligence and security agencies is well-known," the ruling Communist Party's official mouthpiece said in a front-page commentary.
The English-language Global Times, a subsidiary of the People's Daily, also hit out at Google, saying it had made a "huge strategic misstep in the promising Chinese market."
China Daily slammed Google for offering China's 384 million web users access to "pornography and subversive content", saying the Chinese web would "continue to grow in a cleaner and more peaceful environment" without google.cn.
A Google spokeswoman in Singapore declined to discuss TOM's decision, but said the search giant planned to continue serving mainland Chinese users by re-routing its service through Hong Kong, a semi-autonomous Chinese territory.
It was too early to say whether any of Google's 600 staff in mainland China would be moved to Hong Kong, the spokeswoman said.
Hong Kong has pledged not to interfere with Google's plan.
Elinor Leung, head of Asia Internet and telecommunications research with brokerage CLSA, said it was likely other Google partners, including phone giant China Mobile and internet portal operator Sina, would follow TOM's lead.
Although Google's mainland Chinese sales are relatively small, China Mobile pulling away would be a big blow for the US company and present a major opportunity to China-based rivals, Leung said.
Despite Google's promise of uncensored results, searches on the mainland of politically sensitive key words continue to generate the browser message "cannot display the webpage", suggesting China's "Great Firewall" of internet control remained intact.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin urged the US administration to make the censorship row between China and the internet giant a "high priority", in an interview published in London's The Guardian, yesterday.