Residents of Pakistan may still be able to use VPN services without restrictions, as the country's telecommunications body has decided not to ban VPN use after all. This came as Pakistan's Ministry of Justice said the government cannot legally block VPNs.
The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) originally set a deadline of November 30 to begin implementing a new policy regulating the use of VPNs. Under the new rules, companies and freelancers would only be able to use a registered service for legitimate purposes, such as banking, foreign missions, corporate companies, universities, IT companies and call centers.
However, on Saturday, November 30, PTA Chief President Major General (Retd) Hafeezul Rehman announced the government's decision to extend the registration deadline. A day later, the PTA withdrew the VPN ban entirely “due to lack of legal basis,” Pakistani English-language newspaper Dawn reported.
What's behind the VPN debate in Pakistan?
Pakistanis have increasingly turned to the best VPN apps throughout 2024 as a means to bypass the increasing restrictions imposed by the government.
WhatsApp is the latest social media platform blocked in the country this year. The lockdown was implemented just two days after authorities restricted Bluesky amid a surge in popularity around the world. X (formerly Twitter) has been inaccessible without a VPN since February. Meta's Facebook and Instagram were also restricted in July 2024 and May 2023, respectively, according to Surfshark's Internet Tracker.
While this circumvention software becomes a crucial resource for residents and visitors alike, authorities also reportedly targeted VPN use during the year. Residents have been facing temporary connectivity issues since February (exactly when X was first restricted).
In August, the government first shared plans to regulate VPN use as a way to curb VPN misuse. Authorities would later consider unregistered VPNs to be a “security risk” to Pakistan as they can be used to access “sensitive data.”
The PTA has been urging businesses and freelancers to register their VPN service with the telecommunications body to avoid disruption. However, the lack of guidelines for non-commercial VPN users opened debate over whether the government could actually legally ban VPNs in the country.
Now it seems they have found the answer: banning VPNs in Pakistan is against the law, according to the country's Ministry of Justice.
“There was a problem of interpretation of the clauses of the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) of 2016, and it has finally been observed that the Home Office's reading on the matter was weak and the courts would allow the VPN to operate,” a Home Office source told Dawn.
Know?
A virtual private network (VPN) is security software that encrypts your Internet connections to prevent spying. It also spoofs the location of your real IP address to increase anonymity and grant access to otherwise geo-restricted content.
Under section 34 of PECA, the government can block content but not tools (like VPNs, in this case).
The news is likely to come as a relief to the thousands of Pakistanis who rely on VPN services to continue accessing the free web and protect their online privacy. However, the problems for VPN users across the country may not end here.
Prominent people close to the government have often criticized the use of VPNs. On November 15, for example, Pakistan's religious leader argued that the use of a VPN is against Islamic law and called for its ban. The Ministry of Home Affairs also called for blocking all “illegal” VPNs on the same day, claiming that terrorists use these tools “to facilitate violent activities and financial transactions in Pakistan.”
In a briefing before a Senate committee, the PTA president also reiterated that “people should not access unauthorized social media apps or websites through VPN,” Dawn reported.
In addition to growing anti-VPN sentiment, Pakistan has reportedly implemented a China-like internet firewall that “has the ability to block VPNs,” a Defense Ministry official familiar with the new deployments told Al Jazeera.
It's still hard to say for sure whether VPN censorship will increase or not, but we can expect the debate over VPNs in Pakistan to continue to evolve over the coming weeks.
