Halalgoogling.com is dreaming big, as they aim to become, "the number one search engine in the Muslim community." Simply put, the site's strict filters prevent users from accessing haram, or forbidden, content through the search engine, although according to their blog, users can do much more.
Haram literally means "forbidden," and is applied to moral and dietary guidelines for Muslims, whereas halal means "permissible."
From their blog:
Halalgoogling has a special filtering system that excludes Haram (forbidden) sites or content from the search results such as pornography, nudity, gay, lesbian, bisexual, gambling, anti-Islamic content or anything else that is Haram according to the Islamic law.
The Haram filtering system is not the only creative technology that makes Halalgoogling unique. We also offer many other innovative features like Category assistant, Random topics, Quick look, Special Shopping and other.
Google beware!
This is what happens if you try to look for porn on HalalGoogle:
(Image: "No results found or you have searched Haram (forbidden) content")
Pretty advanced stuff.
How does one develop a "haram filter," you ask? According to their press release, a team of international "internet experts" has been hard at work for years to determine what is halal or haram according to "the Law of Islam."
So why Halalgoogling? The makers of of the tool cite easy access to pornography as one of the internet's biggest dangers, particularly with regard to the large amount of children that use it. According to the blog, approximately 90% of children aged 8 to 16 have seen Internet porn.
Their Twitter announces that an app for iOS users is coming soon, so people can HalalGoogle on their iPads to their heart's content. The Android app is already up and running on Google Play.
It's worth playing around with to see which search pages have been altered the most, and Kim Kardashian is a case in point. The curvaceous reality star and new mother has apparently been deemed almost totally haram, and her search results are almost completely scrubbed of anything that actually relates to her.
Halalgoogling.com joins a host of other religiously-oriented search engines, such as Jewogle, a parody which "celebrates the Jewish contribution to civilization," and SeekFind.org, a Christian website with content filters that prevent users from accessing pages that attack or denigrate their faith.