A representative of the Chinese government said Saturday that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was being "disrespectful" when she urged U.S. companies to stand up to internet censorship in authoritarian countries like China.

We know how to run our internet, thank you very much, and we don't need lessons from you.

That was the message Chinese authorities sent Saturday in response to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's harshcriticism of the regime's internet censorship and repressive human rights policies. A representative of the Communist government said Clinton was being "disrespectful" when she urged U.S. companies to stand up to internet censorship in authoritarian countries like China.

"On the Internet question, China doesn't need any lessons from the United States on what to do or how," said Min Dahong, Chairman of the Beijing Association of Online Media. Min's statement was published Saturday in Xinhuanet.com, the state-run website of China's official propaganda arm. It came one day after China's foreign minister said Clinton's statement was "harmful to Sino-American relations."

Growing Tension

The verbal sniping is the latest fallout from Google's (GOOG) decision to challenge China over web censorship and cyber-attacks. A single incendiary blog post by Google -- in which the U.S. web giant declared it would no longer censor its Chinese search engine -- has now led to what one geopolitical expert called the biggest U.S.-China rift in a decade. The widening spat has cast a light on the difficulties U.S. internet companies face in China.