Pakistan Plans to Regulate VPNs to Curb Their Widespread Use

• Pakistan’s PTA is trying to force VPNs to register with the government.
• Around 30% of Pakistan’s Web users actively use a VPN service.
• This isn’t the first time the country is trying to disrupt VPN providers.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Chairman, retired Major-General Hafeezur Rehman, announced that the organization is working on regulating VPN services. More precisely, the PTA plans to approve VPN providers it deems compliant based on yet-to-be-announced criteria.

This latest move follows the country’s decision to restrict access to social media sites such as X (Twitter), which has been inaccessible since February 2024. The country’s authorities briefly pulled the plug on the Internet during election day. However, access to X and other social media sites became disrupted following a senior government official’s admission of rigging election results, which sparked a series of protests across Pakistan.

Following the ban on X, various online sources have reported a spike in the number of VPN sign-ups from the country, ranging from 130% to 300%. The PTA now claims that around 30% of Internet users in Pakistan use a VPN, even though there’s no definite way to verify that claim.

Around 56% of the Pakistani population has Internet access, meaning there are 137,000,000 Internet users. According to the PTA, around 30% of them use a VPN, so this latest decision threatens to affect 41,000,000 individuals across Pakistan.

That said, Pakistan’s officials seem to know that a blanket ban on VPNs could cause significant issues. In response to the latest developments, Senator Rana Mahmoodul Hasan, the PTA chief, noted that blocking VPNs would “lead to the collapse of several IT businesses that operate on VPNs.”

Also, this isn’t the first time Pakistan has shown a negative stance towards VPNs. A few years ago, the PTA tried to force individuals to register their use of VPNs by sharing their CNIC (Computerized National Identity Card) with their Internet provider. However, there were few takers, and that measure was never fully implemented.

The PTA also tried to implement VPN regulation in 2010, but like most other measures to curb the use of VPN services, the end result remained evasive.

In conclusion, we’ll add that you shouldn't put your trust in just about any VPN’s hands. Only the top-rated VPNs for Pakistan can deliver the level of privacy protection that deserves your trust, especially considering the country's tendency to impose censorship more often than ever before.