PTA to decide VPNs fate in Pakistan soon

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) will decide the fate of unregistered Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) across the country soon.

The issue was raised during the recent Senate committee meeting on IT and Telecom, chaired by Senator Palwasha Khan.

The PTI chairman stated that the authority has received complaints against social media apps including 95% of TikTok, 65% of Meta, and 22% of X (formerly Twitter) requests.

He said that the PTA is working to manage internet restrictions in Pakistan, similar to Dubai and China.

The PTA chairman revealed that 20,500 individuals have registered their VPNs with the authority and a campaign is underway to encourage registration.

He warned the unregistered VPNs would be blocked.

Earlier, in a move to ensure uninterrupted operations of businesses, including software houses, call centers, freelancers, and foreign missions, PTA launched a one-window operation to whitelist IP and VPN registration.

The registration process is now available through a unified “one window” operation on the PTA and PSEB websites.