Yesterday Chinese lawyer Li Fangping, said that filtering software to be made mandatory on every PC in the country would not only block adult sites, but also access to the countries gay community websites. Today reports suggest that the software will also block political content.
According to ZDNet (which cites the Wall Street Journal) a report by Harvard University researcher Isaac Mao, who has seen the code, says there are two kinds of keyword documents in the software: one is related to pornographic content, and the other related to political content. Not only that but the documents related to political stuff are much, much bigger than those related to pornographic content.
Speculation that the software did more than the government were letting on has been mounting since China first announced the decision earlier this week and computer experts believe that with Green Dam installed on every computer, the Chinese government will gain access to personal information and have the ability to monitor Internet use through the software.
The founder of Green Dam is denying everything, claiming that he knows what’s on his own blacklist. For more on this click here. To read about Li Fangping efforts to have the decision reconsidered, click here.