The Chinese government wanted to force manufacturers to bundle an internet filtering software with personal computers. The software would have been used to ban internet pornography and violent websites in China.
Computer researchers argued that the program also blocks politically sensitive material and apparently allows monitoring of user activity by authorities.
The plan was condemned by critics of censorship and the officials from Washington which called it “politically intrusive, technically ineffective and commercially unfair”.
Computer experts from University of Michigan managed to crack the list of filtered words. The list contains mainly words related to sex and violence, but also words that have no place being there. According to blogger Fang Zhouzi , “the list includes common terms like “essence”. I can’t even imagine what “essence” counts as. Green Dam monitors word processing in addition to internet. So does this mean that from now on the word “essence” can no longer appear in school essays, textbooks and dictionaries?”
The official Xinhua News Agency said regulators “will delay” the plan but gave no indication whether it might take effect later.
The software will be available for download and will be delivered preinstalled by most of the computer manufacturers. If Acer already shipped computers with Green Dam preinstalled, Dell and HP declined to discuss their intentions.
Green Dam will be available for Windows operating system only.
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