Digital rights | Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF)

Pakistan Press Foundation

Monitoring transparency: Govt websites yet to comply with RTI law, says report

Pakistan Press Foundation

KARACHI: The Punjab government has made little progress in making its websites comply with its transparency and right to information law, a report by digital rights groups says. It says that there have been only small improvements in this regard over July-December 2015 period. The fourth biannual State of Proactive Disclosure of Information in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa […]


Cybercrime bill under scrutiny

Pakistan Press Foundation

The Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act 2015 tabled in May 2015, commonly known as the Cybercrime Bill, was aimed at keeping check on the cyber domains in Pakistan. It is still under discussion with the civil society feeling that the bill is akin to an Electronic Martial Law. Pakhtunkhwa Civil Society Network (PCSN), Blue Veins, […]


YouTube back with vague transparency

Pakistan Press Foundation

ISLAMABAD: It has been 10 days since access to YouTube in Pakistan was reopened, but local producers of the content for the popular video-sharing website continue to worry when the axe will fall next and how. They say they are confused because the agreement between Google and the government of Pakistan, that unblocked YouTube after […]


‘Blasphemy accusations increased after current law introduced’

Pakistan Press Foundation

ISLAMABAD: A study on ‘Blasphemy in the Digital Age’ has revealed that blasphemy accusations increased by almost 200 times after Gen Ziaul Haq amended the blasphemy law. Presented by the Digital Rights Foundation (DRF) on Friday, the study drew comparisons between the period before and after the current blasphemy law was introduced in 1987. Prior […]


Digital rights

Pakistan Press Foundation

The announcement by Blackberry that they would rather leave Pakistan than provide “backdoor” access to the government to its communications has illustrated the kind of attention that is required on the subject of digital rights in Pakistan. In the name of fighting terrorism, vast powers to tap the private communications of citizens have been handed […]


What you cannot see on Facebook

Pakistan Press Foundation

IN an effort towards greater transparency, social networking giant Facebook released its latest ‘Government Requests Report’ containing bare-bones data on requests they receive from countries for access to user account data, and requests to restrict access to content. The current January-June 2014 report is the third such dataset Facebook has released, and, staying true to […]


Censoring the internet

Pakistan Press Foundation

The rise and rise of the internet over the last 20 years to the point of its ubiquity today is both boon and bane for governments everywhere. In large part, this is because the internet is the complete antithesis of government. It is in many ways unregulated and extremely difficult to control where it has […]


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Two years on, YouTube stays shut

Pakistan Press Foundation

KARACHI: Two years, a new government and the promise of change, and at least 20 court hearings later, internet users from Pakistan are still denied access to YouTube. This restriction of access has become the symbol of a state which has increasingly become obsessed with controlling the online space in a non-transparent manner. The ban […]


Prevention of Cyber Crime Act being drafted

Pakistan Press Foundation

The draft of ‘Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act of Pakistan 2014’ is being prepared for presentation in the Parliament. Although this draft law contains welcoming procedural safeguards, quite a number of provisions violate international standards on freedom of expression. Digital Rights Foundation Pakistan and International Organization working on freedom of expression, Article 19, have expressed […]


Pakistan continues silencing dissent through selective web blocks

Pakistan Press Foundation

Urooj M, a former DJ on a Pakistani FM radio channel, also a film aficionado, was incredulous when she found the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) had blocked the Internet Movie Database (IMDb). She tweeted: “SERIOUSLY #PAKISTAN, WHY ON EARTH WOULD YOU BAN #IMDB!!! COME ON, SERIOUSLY!!!???!!!! #FirstYoutubeNowIMDB #WTF.” This widely used online entertainment news portal, […]


Legislation for digital content copyrights

Pakistan Press Foundation

A LARGE number of people in Pakistan consume digital content such as applications, online games, videos, music, software and e-books. Despite its large-scale consumption, unfortunately, there is no proper law on the subject in the country that provides adequate protection to the consumers of digital content. Most of the countries have promulgated laws on the […]