PTA Orders ISPs to Block Over 400,000 Objectionable Websites

Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) is about to begin a major crackdown against websites containing any objectionable content. The telecom regulator has contacted all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to block a vast number of websites after Supreme Court’s order to remove any objectionable material accessible to the people of Pakistan.

PTA ordered ISPs on Monday to take down over 400,000 adult websites. Access to any similar sites, which contain pornographic material or smut, will be restricted at the domain level. To be exact, 429,343 websites with pornography were listed in the issued directive.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan ordered the PTA to take steps in restricting access to any immoral material available online. The order said that “PTA should take remedial steps to quantify the nefarious phenomenon of obscenity and pornography that has an imminent role to corrupt and vitiate the youth of Pakistan”.

Supreme Court’s order was issued on 12th January 2016. It said that internet is a global necessity as information regarding global developments and access to knowledge are easily available to anyone around the world. Such means of information should be encouraged and promoted so people have to spend less and gain knowledge from international institutions. The order reads, that access to this information should be qualified such that nasty and problematic content is removed before it reaches the general population.

The order says that wicked content “has the potential to corrupt and vitiate the youth. This aspect of the subject has to be thought over holistically so that the negative part of the information may not spoil our young generation.”

The regulatory body says that this is just a pre-emptive measure against objectionable content available online. Initially, the current list of over 400,000 websites will be blocked by each ISP on their networks.

ISPs are saying that the list indeed extensive but it’s a big challenge and will take a lot of time to block all of the content. ISP officials state that blocking websites at the domain level is quite costly and such a large list will require system-wide changes and special equipment alongside a substantial number of man-hours. However, due to legal requirements, all ISPs have begun to implement PTA’s restriction order over their networks.

He is the Chief Content Officer at ProPakistani. Reach out at aadil.s[at]propakistani.pk


  • Telecom SMS packages along should also be banned many teenagers waste their time on sms.If possible ban services like whatsapp also or atleast monitor them that they are not used for entertainment purpose by students.

    • Internet/ Laptops/ Phones should be banned because students use facebook etc on it and waste their time, right? I hope you don’t breed.

    • TV Channels sare Band hone Chaien, TV pe hi ban lagna Chaie ha Student ka Sakht Time Zya hota ha, Akhbaar b ni Chapne Chaie Studnets parhenge to time zaya hoga.bacho ko ghar se bahar hi ni nikalne dena chaie, kahi idhr udhr par k time zaya na karden.

  • Ya Allah utha le in sab ko jo bachelors ko p**n bhi nhn dekhne dete bas ek Pakistan he Islam ka muhafiz hai baqi to sare farishte hain, haq pe he har koi Pakistan se nikalna chahta hai

  • hahhahaha lol commnets …….sara bachara Shahzad,Dr shahid,Salman Qamar , Adeel mujhya porn dekh ka zindagi guzrana wala lagta ha….jin ka zindagi ka aik hi maqsad ha porn dekhna censorship to Iran ma b ha Duabai aur arab countries ma b .

  • Immoral according to? I won’t be surprised that many of those “objectionable” websites are anti PML-N.

  • haha PTA Is so stupid ban ban youth has enough ways to get what they want like noone was using youtube in pakistan when you banned it

  • I just hope that pings in online games don’t increase further due to bad routing and increased hops. Its already worst then India strangely when connecting to European based servers which is strange as technically Pakistan is much nearer to Europe geographically then India.

  • Instead of implementing a half-internet sized ban list, thus bringing down already horrible internet speed, PTA should implement an allow list. Allow only 5-7 essential web sites, and ban everything else.
    Na ho ga baans, na bajay gi bansuri.

  • LOL…!! 780,000 is greater than 400,000…!! Wasn’t it done 4 years ago? PTA is so slow!

  • What does domain level block means? Does it means ke is ban ke baad site proxy/vpn se bhi nahi khule gi?

    If thats not the case then koi faida nahi is ban ka, because yeh ban tu already hai aur Youtube ke ban ke baad har banda hi janta hai ke blocked sites kaise chalani hain.

    • It just means that the domain and all it’s sub-links will be blocked. VPNs will still work (until the start actively blocking them as well)

  • Now they’ll block every other website jiskay slug main ghalti se bhi s*x aa gya ho ya kisi user ne forum main s*x ka thread start krdia ho (jo kay block bhi hogya ho) :/

  • Improve the QUALITY OF EDUCATION you provide so that YOUTH can filter out whats not good for them intellectually….. #BuildingAState101 n00bs….

  • Yaar tum sub itni tension kyu la rahay ho….. Zenmate install ker lo browser per aur jo marzi site access keroo…

      • in Accounting terms Fahad apka Ledger khool gya hy gunahon ka and jo bhi Zenmate install krky website access kryga uska gunah apkay account may jayga.. Congrats…

        • Lol. Is tarha to apka bhi ek ledger khul gaya hai. Zenmate ka name apne use kiya hai aur apke long comment ko dekh ke main personally apka message parh kar install karne laga hoon Zenmate. Aur maine surely kuch friends waghera se bhi share karoon ga Zenmate ko. Mera aur meray friends ki tamam masturbations aur pleasure ka sawab apke sar jaye ga! Congzzzzzzzzzz!

  • It’s not about p**n, it’s all about our independence. Hum jo bhi karen jo bhi dekhen us pe PTA aur Supreme court of Pakistan ka koi haq nhn ye sari baat hamare haq ki hai par ap nhn samjho ge agar samajhte to ap par sms na bante ??

    • Brother Haq apni limits my reh kr laina chahiye. Kal ap bologay ky ksi ko shoot krna bhi apka haq hay, bazar my naked ghomna bhi apka haq hy.. After all we are Muslims and have defined limits and govt bodies have the duty to maintain law and order in the society.. Grow up and get out out these porn stuff. may Allah hep you and all of us to restrain for immoral acts….

      • Who the hell are watching p**n I’m taking about independence aur ye PTA wale waise he pagal ho gaye hain jab dil karta hai kuch na kuch ban kar diya for example YouTube ab hum beth k sara time blasphemous video he dekhen ge aur koi kaam nhn hai aur please har cheez mein mazhab ko mat lao ache insan ban jao kafi hai

    • Adeel QADYANI ap na sahi kaha ,,,,,ap ka mazhab ki sites b band ho gai ha asal bat yeh ha

      • Hahaha tu chai bana k pi bhai tere liye yahan kuch nhn tum logon ko bas dehshatgardi karna aati hai aur khud pe sms banwana

  • Hahahahahahaha whenever i read this type of articles i laugh a lot even a kid from second grade know’s how to open blocked sites just waste of money on the wages of hired idiots by PTA this is the mulla soch any one have a direct acess to a porn site can j*rk off as he will acess it with a proxy iam sure it will never effect on video quality be :D lol if they spend a little money on the security of Gov websites that would be great almost 80% of websites of Gov can be hacked. :D


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