Controversy
On February 22, 2008, PTA attempted to block regional access to YouTube following a government order. The attempt inadvertently caused a worldwide YouTube blackout that took 20 hours to correct. Four days later, PTA lifted the ban after YouTube removed controversial religious comments made by a Dutch Member of Parliament concerning Islam.
On 14 November 2011, PTA distributed a list of 1,695 "obscene" words (1,109 in English and 586 in Urdu) to mobile network operators and gave them 7 days to mandatory implement SMS filtering. Many of the banned words were expletives or sexual slang, but the list included medical terms (such as "athlete's foot") and benign words (such as "Jesus" and "Budweiser"). Following widespread ridicule by the Pakistani public, particularly on social media, PTA backed down and promised more consultation on the final list of banned words.
PTA in collaboration with PTCL has also been surreptitiously blocking porn and other sites regarded as "undesirable" or "offensive". As of 01 Jan 2012, the block first detected in November remains in place. The block includes the popular music website Last.fm, for reasons unknown and unexplained. The block leads to a time out or redirects users to YouTube. Majority of the wired Pakistani society remains largely ignorant of this block, with no word forthcoming from PTA in explanation of their actions as of 4 Jan, 2012.
On 15 Jan, 2013 Lahore High Court terms the appointment of Farooq Ahmed Awan Illegal and Terminated him as the Chairman Pakistan Telecommunication Authority. Farooq Ahmed Awan Illegal Appointment as Chairman PTA was done on 27 Jul, 2012 after Dr. Muhammad Yaseen, step down as the Chairman Pakistan Telecommunication Authority.
Read more about this topic: Pakistan Telecommunication Authority
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