The Linux movement will snuff that out...
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The only way that they could enforce this is if they can somehow monitor traffic on the Internet/Web and block traffic coming from machines that don't have the software installed (doesn't ping or call home)...
I don't see why they would need spyware if they can just control the server connections and block offensive/politically unfavorable sites *unless* they want to be able to activate your webcam without your knowledge to spy on you.
You're on the right track but not thinking widely enough. What they want is for "The Authorities" to be able to access your system to perform a host of surreptitious activities that include little things like poisoning users hosts file to steer them away from proxies, keylog login codes to ... well anything but I imagine counter-government websites would be of particular interest, scan documents for frequent occurances of interesting phrases such as "Free Tibet" "Dalai lama" especially in proximity to "Demonstration", and bigger things such as installing root level worms to further enhance their capabilities. Having the capability to install software surreptitiously for instance means that they could set up a nationwide bot-net that would be staggering in its DDoS capability. I mean we're talking serious weapon-grade capability here.
The possibilities of what they can do are by and large limited only by the government's imagination.
They'd better have start planning to override the electrical tape, then.