MaSSSoftech

BEIJING -- Some Chinese schools are removing the Web-filtering software that Chinese authorities ordered installed on all computers this summer, further weakening the influence of a controversial censorship measure that was intended for PC users throughout China.

Schools are still required to use the software, called Green Dam-Youth Escort, but it is unclear exactly to what extent they heed the requirement. Calls to a number of schools gave a varied picture: Some schools use the software, others installed it but have since removed it and yet others never installed it. The disparity may be due to how stringently local governments enforce the requirement.

Beijing's No. 50 High School posted a notice on its Web site this month saying, "In order to ensure a smooth operation of the school's daily education and teaching tasks, we will gradually remove the 'Green Dam' software soon for all the computers with Internet access."

Wang Zhenyu, the teacher in charge of Internet management at the Beijing No. 50 High School, said the school installed Green Dam on more than 400 computers after being notified by its district education committee in the city district of Chongwen that it was required. But he said the school realized after the installation of the software, teachers could no longer access the intranet programs they needed to manage students' information and review their performances.

An official in the Chongwen district education commission's Internet administration center said the commission did receive complaints from schools about problems with the software conflicting with teaching software. "Green Dam itself is imperfect, and it needs to be further improved by the company," said the official, who would only give his name as Mr. Sun. The commission reported it to higher authorities, but "we haven't received answers from the municipal commission about removing the software yet," Mr. Sun said, adding that the schools had their own filtering system before Green Dam became a requirement. "I don't know why we still need to install such software," he said.

In Shanghai, Wang Bing, a computer teacher at Changzheng Middle School, said Green Dam had a "serious conflict" with antivirus software by McAfee Inc., which is required by the school's district education committee. Once Green Dam was installed, the computers "died" immediately after being turned on, so the school uninstalled it on all but a few computers placed in classrooms for teachers, he said.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology tried to mandate that all personal computer manufacturers ship Green Dam—a program created by two Chinese companies—with computers sold in China beginning in July, saying it would block pornography and other content inappropriate for children. The ministry notified PC makers through a circular that was distributed privately.

But after the requirement was made public by The Wall Street Journal in June, consumers and international industry officials pushed back. Chinese consumers complained that the requirement took freedom of choice away from users, and alleged possible corruption because the procurement process for the software wasn't transparent. Industry groups asked Chinese authorities to reconsider the measure, saying it imposed an unreasonable deadline and that it was wrong to require use of a specific company's product.

Meanwhile researchers in and outside of China found that the software censored more than pornography, and actually blocked a wide range of content including Web sites about subjects including homosexuality and the spiritual group Falun Gong. They also said mass installation of the software in the world's second largest PC market by units shipped would make computers vulnerable to cyber attacks.

The measure was eventually scaled down. After delaying in late June the requirement to have Green Dam installed, Li Yizhong, China's industry and information technology minister, said last month that mass installation of Green Dam would not be forced, but that schools, Internet cafes and other public computers would need to have it installed.

MIIT didn't respond to requests for comment. Chinese authorities, which seek to control information about a number of topics on the Internet by regulating locally run Web sites and blocking some foreign Web sites, have insisted the software was intended to be optional for users.

PC makers Hewlett-Packard Co. and Dell Inc. have not shipped the software, while Sony Corp. and Acer Inc. both said they started to ship Green Dam with laptops, then later stopped. Taiwan-based Asustek Computer Inc., as well as China's Lenovo Group Ltd., have shipped the software with at least a portion of computers for the Chinese market even after the delay, but the companies did not respond to inquiries on whether they are still shipping the software.

Still, Green Dam is currently only available for use with Microsoft Corp.'s Windows operating systems, so any computers that do not ship with Windows pre-installed would not have Green Dam pre-installed either. Several Internet café owners reached in Beijing also said they have not installed Green Dam. With school administrators removing the software as well, the reach of the Green Dam measure is scaled down further.

To be sure, schools around China, including in Shanghai and Guizhou, said they were notified by their local governments to install Green Dam on their computer, and have complied. An administrator at the No.1 High School of Anshun in Guizhou Province said the software has not created any problems for the school's computer network, likely because the school computers run very few programs that could conflict with it. But several schools in Beijing, including Beijing National Day School, a combined middle school and high school, and Beijing Yuying School, a K-12 school, said they never installed the software to begin with because they were never notified of the requirement.
—Ellen Zhu in Shanghai, Sue Feng and Kersten Zhang in Beijing and Ting-I Tsai in Taipei contributed to this article.