China Requires Use of ‘Blue Dam’ Surveillance Software
September 14th, 2009 — Bruce EtlingGlobal Voices Advocacy tells us that China’s latest attempt to control the Internet – ‘Blue Dam’ – became active on September 13, and the government is requiring ISPs to use the software or face punishment. Blue Dam is an ISP-level surveillance application that is, apparently, meant to solve many of the problems stemming from the failed launch of Green Dam, which the Chinese government initially insisted must be installed on all PCs sold in China, even those sold by foreign companies, and even though large chunks of the code were stolen from existing, patented software applications.
Carrying surveillance out at the ISP level follows the methodology China employs to filter blogs, as Rebecca McKinnon (the go to source on Chinese Internet issues) has shown, by forcing ISPs to do much of the dirty work of the censors. This is also not dissimilar from how Russia apparently monitors Internet activity. How effective any government will be at monitoring the work of millions of Internet users remains to be seen, but it is certainly a development free speech advocates are going to be concerned about, and could lead to another backlash by Chinese Internet users.
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September 25th, 2009 at 7:42 am
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