The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has blocked Wikipedia services in the country for “not blocking/removing sacrilegious content”. The action was taken after the online encyclopedia apparently failed to take down the reported content within the 48-hour deadline issued by the authority on Wednesday.
The ban has been confirmed by Wikipedia’s parent organisation, the Wikimedia Foundation.
“On 1 February, we received a notification from the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority [PTA] stating ‘the services of Wikipedia have been degraded for 48 hours’ for failure to remove content deemed ‘unlawful’,” says the Wikimedia Foundation in an official statement. “As of 3 February, our data shows this has extended into a full block.”
Wikipedia has been blocked in Pakistan.
Today, Pakistan’s Telecommunications Authority blocked @Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects in the country.
Follow the thread for more information 🧵⬇️ (1/4)https://t.co/8xM73if9B2
— Wikimedia Foundation (@Wikimedia) February 4, 2023
On Wednesday, the PTA announced that Wikipedia services had been “degraded” in the country for 48 hours over the platform’s “failure” to remove the reported content. The authority claimed that Wikipedia had been given an “opportunity of hearing”, but it neither removed the “unlawful” content nor appeared before the regulator.
The telecom regulator has threatened to block the online encyclopedia in the country if the reported content is not removed.
Read: https://t.co/ea7Ra2YW6v pic.twitter.com/LOyD6XThzS
— Digital Rights Monitor (@DRM_News) February 1, 2023
“The Wikimedia Foundation believes that access to knowledge is a human right,” reads the statement. “Wikipedia is the world’s largest online encyclopedia, and the main source of trusted information for millions. It’s an ever-growing record of history, and gives people from all backgrounds the opportunity to contribute to everyone’s understanding of their religion, heritage, and culture.”
The organisation has called on the government of Pakistan to restore access to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects “immediately”.
According to Wikimedia Foundation, the free online encyclopedia (English), which is the go-to resource for information for a large number of internet users globally, receives more than 50 million page views a month from Pakistan, followed by Urdu and Russian Wikipedias. The Wikimedia Foundation does not make decisions around the nature of content that is made available on Wikipedia or how it is maintained, the statement adds.
“We hope that the Pakistan government joins with the Wikimedia Foundation in a commitment to knowledge as a human right and restores access to Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects promptly, so that the people of Pakistan can continue to receive and share knowledge with the world.”
The PTA’s decision is being roundly condemned on social media, with both users and digital rights advocates terming the ban a “regressive move” and “arbitrary censorship”.
