Green Dam's mandatory installation delayed indefinitely

The mandatory installation of the Green Dam-Youth Escort filtering software has been postponed to give computer producers more time.

The filtering software, which was supposed to deny access to pornographic and violent sites, was scheduled to go live today. However, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) postponed it without giving a new date when the order would take effect.

Computer producers have said that the installation of the software on such a massive scale demanded extra time, Xinhua reported.

The Ministry will still provide free download of the software and equip school and internet bar computers with Green Dam after July 1, a ministry spokesman said.

The unidentified spokesman reiterated that computer users were not required to use the software. Even if Green Dam is pre-installed, users can easily switch it on or off.

He also said that Green Dam will not collect information on the user or his online activities.

Green Dam is particularly aimed at parents who want to control minors' online activities. Zhao Huiqin, president of Jinhui Computer Engineering Co. Ltd., which developed the software, said that it has gained popularity among parents.

“There had been a geometric growth in Green Dam users this month,” she was quoted by Xinhua as saying. She said they have seen an average of more than 100,000 users registering the software per day and the highest daily level had reached 400,000.

Ministry figures show that the software has been downloaded 7.17 million times from the developer's site. Another 2.62 million school computers and 4.7 million computers in internet bars have also been installed with Green Dam.

A number of issues had been raised about the Green Dam internet filtering software, including that its Chinese developers had copied part of their code from a similar program developed by an American company.

There are also concerns that the software would enable the government to track individual computer usage and limit access to topics it considered too sensitive, the LA Times reported.

Security vulnerabilities detected in the software have also been criticized.