These 6 tech companies have made the controversial decision to try to operate in China, where the government can demand social media posts be removed or search results be censored

• China's "Great Firewall" of internet censorship blocks content that the government deems sensitive, including reports of political unrest and references to Taiwan as an independent country.
• US tech companies including Facebook, Twitter, and others are banned from the country.
• But some tech companies made the controversial decision to comply with China's strict standards in order to operate within its borders.
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The US and China are locked in an intensifying cold war, and the global tech industry is at the center of it. 

The standoff affects everything from supply chains to the sites everyday consumers can use - the US recently banned companies like Huawei from doing business in the US, and on the flip side, many US tech companies are banned from operating in China under its strict "Great Firewall" of censorship.

Wikipedia, Twitter, and Facebook, are among the major websites that Chinese users can't access. Other companies have controversially decided to make concessions to China in order to operate in the country, including Microsoft and Apple. US companies that comply with Chinese censorship policies often face criticism, which led Google to abandon plans to expand a search engine to the country.

Here are all the ways that tech companies have operated - or attempted to operate - in China under the Great Firewall.

Apple, Microsoft, Google, Airbnb, and Blizzard all did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment on their operations in China.