- China builds in Pakistan an internet censorship system similar to its notorious Store Firewall
- The two countries have reportedly worked for nearly a year on this infrastructure that can block most foreign sites
- This is coming as Pakistan also actively trying to regulate VPN use across the country
China seeks to repeat its notorious Great Digital Firewall by helping Pakistan build a similar system on its own funds.
According to the latest intelligence online report, Islamabad and Beijing have been working for almost a year on this project set to increase censorship and surveillance levels in the country significantly. All of this comes as Pakistan has intensified its efforts to regulate the use of the best VPN services.
The great digital firewall in Pakistan
While, like Russia and Iran, have increased their national internet capacities recently, China’s large digital firewall remains the most successful example of a superb Internet infrastructure. That’s exactly what Chinese companies are now helping Islamabad build – the big digital firewall in Pakistan.
Such a system is expected to block most foreign sites where de facto increases the current censurn levels in the country. It is worth reminding that Pakistanis cannot access all the most important social media platforms without a virtual private network at the time of writing, with X being blocked since February 2024.
While the Pakistani government said this infrastructure “would only be used to protect two strategic data exchange points on the national network,” as reported by intelligence online, authorities will be able to activate firewall when needed.
However, allegations of Pakistan using Chinese censorship and surveillance technology are not new. Al Jazeera reported in November last year, actually about some secret tests of China-like ‘Firewall’ tools for Monitor online traffic, and regulates the use of popular apps.
Such a system “has the ability to block VPNs,” also – an official of the ministry familiar with the new implementations, Al Jazeera told at the time.
P@Sha sounds the alarm! 🚨 The rapidly implemented firewall is an important setback for Pakistan’s technology sector. Businesses are struggling to survive in the middle of paralyzing internet breaks and vpn -woes.read P@Sha’s official statement about National Firewall: pic.twitter.com/jowehzjpyjAugust 16, 2024
Pakistan’s VPN crash has been a developing case for a total of 2024 and into 2025.
After trying to crack down on VPN use by directly disrupting the services, the Internet Guard Dog reported Netblocks first VPN restrictions seven days after X had been blocked. PTA shared plans to regulate the use of unregistered VPNs as a way of limiting abuse back in August.
The plan was eventually withdrawn at the end of the year due to lack of legal reasons for banning VPNs under Pakistan’s Ministry of Law. A new license category for VPN providers was introduced in December as the latest bid to regulate Pakistan VPN use.
Whether it is early to predict what is at stake for VPN users in the country, experts have already raised some concerns about the consequences of a National Firewall.
In the case, Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA) said last year: “The introduction of Firewall has triggered a perfect storm of challenges, with long -term Internet interruptions and erratic VPN performance that threatens a complete meltdown of business operations.”
