A Dutch company recently launched ImHalal, the world’s first Islamic search engine, says Times Online. ImHalal works like any other search engines until potentially illicit words are entered, at which point the search is rated from one to three on its risk of generating haram, or ‘forbidden,’ material.

Reza Sardeha, founder of AZS Media Group, which runs the search engine, developed the site after friends and family complained of regular search results containing illicit content. “The idea grew up when some friends of mine complained that when they searched on Google or Yahoo once in a while they bumped into sexually explicit content,” he comments.

“Before we started this, we got the feeling that a lot of people in the Middle East, a lot of Muslims, really avoided the internet and prevented their children from accessing the internet because they were afraid their children might come into contact with sexually explicit material,” continues Mr. Sardeha.

About 100,000 users have accessed the site since its launch. Mr. Sardeha aspires to make the engine the standard homepage for the world’s online Muslims, who number at least 100 million. “Our main goal is to become the number one website in every Muslim home,” Sardeha declared, as quoted in the Pune Mirror.

The National reports that the website, now seven months in development, is available in 15 languages including in Arabic, Chinese, Farsi, Turkish, and English. The company expects its largest audience to develop in the Middle East, where there is a more “moderate to conservative mindset.”

When a search rates one or two on the haram scale, a user may choose to take the risk and click through the results, reports Times Online. A three-rated search, on the other hand, yields no results, only the message: “Oops! Your search inquiry has a Haram level of 3 out of 3! I would like to advise you to change your search terms and try again.”

ImHalal’s filter examines the users’ speech terms and the results that come up, trawling for a “danger list” of words. Sex related terms, such as “gay”, “lesbian”, or simply “sex” merit a haram level of three. “Beer” and “pork” only merit one point while “drugs” earns two.

Saad Hamid on Sizlopedia entered queries like “alcohol” and “nudity” and said that “ImHalal does exactly what it's supposed to; it blocks the query and warns the user since the results for the query may contain haram content.” Hamid added, “Now it may not be the best search engine out there but it still comes with a noble purpose. Especially, it can be of great use in Muslim households where the parents are concerned about the types of sites their children visit on the Internet.”

“Dating” or “wrestling” are not restricted on the site, nor are more abstract concepts generally deemed to be forbidden in Islam, such “mortgages”, “suicide”, or “magic”, says Times Online. Mr. Sardeha admits that the filter needs some fine-tuning. One example is the permissible status of “hot pants.”

“We are a social company — we have a feedback button and every two minutes someone gets in touch,” he said. “Someone already pointed out the problem with ‘bikini’.” Users of the site are encouraged to give feedback and suggest filtering keywords.

Mr. Sardeha argued on the National that the engine has “blocked all sexually explicit content,” adding, “We are also in talks with imams to determine what might be considered haram and therefore be blocked.”

Although AZS has constructed the site in consultation with Islamic scholars, it is aimed at “the moderate Muslim.” The company does not want to enter into disputes over the possible sinfulness of Facebook or rock music, says Times Online.

AZS hopes to expand ImHalal to include other Islamic programs such as Quran quotes and prayer times, in which there is already a competitive online trade. Days after its launch, ImHalal founders have already found themselves embroiled in an intense online debate with bloggers who claim the engine represents a form of censorship.

“It’s the people’s choice — anyone who actually wants explicit content can easily choose another search engine,” Mr. Sardeha said. In order to generate the haram list, Sardeha admits that he and his colleagues had to spend a long time sifting through illicit internet content. “What can you do?” he says. “That’s a fact of life.”

Mr. Sardeha stressed that he does not want ImHalal to be a political censor with extremist websites, such as far-right or Nazi groups, being blocked, says the National. “Our goal is to create a safe environment for Muslims to search the worldwide web, but we have absolutely no intention of being a dictatorial search engine,” he said. “So people can freely get informed about other religions if they want.”

Mr. Sardeha, 20, is an Iranian-Kuwaiti who has lived in the Netherlands since he was five. Although he is a practicing Muslim, he did not disclose whether he his Sunni or Shiite because he wanted his website to appeal to all Muslims.

Mr. Sardeha says that ImHalal’s development "wasn’t cheap, and the project has really depleted my personal funds;” money he said he had saved from previous internet ventures.

He is considering taking a six month break from his international business management studies to lead the project, which he developed with three other people. The search engine will need outside investment to grow. He does not expected ImHalal to compete with global giants such as Google, but rather to serve as a niche provider.

An official at the General Authority of Islamic Affairs and Endowment’s fatwa hotline said Mr. Sardeha’s idea was a good one, “as long as he is seeking God’s path by this action”. The official cautioned that Mr. Sardeha should seek greater scholarly input and transparency with his users. “There is no problem with it. The important thing, though, is that he seek guidance from a renowned scholar and tell his users the source of the results,” he said.

Mohammed Amer, 22, an Egyptian engineer in the UAE, commended the search engine. “It might be good for people who are scared of using the internet and seeing something bad. It will not prevent someone from looking for bad things, but it will alert you if something is haram.”

The Pune Mirror notes that in the last few years Muslims have become very active on the internet. The lack of tools available to Muslims to carry out searches responsibly was a major inspiration for ImHalal.