PTA, It’s Time to Consider Blocking the Porn is a post from: ProPakistani
We have written in the past about the dire need of blocking porn sites, local ones at least, if not all of them. But clearly PTA couldn't achieve this – and I had to revisit this topic, primarily because of an email we got recently from Majid, a ProPakistani reader.
Here is what Majid Wrote to us:
Dear Aamir,
Many of my friends, including me, from Islamabad received an SMS on 29/05/2011 from a mobile number 03035654XXX, that they are offering sex services in Pakistan.
They also provided details about their website ________, where they are inviting male and female members to get registered on their website and to enjoy / offer services to their counter gender members.
I simply want to express my views about it that we are Muslim and According to Islam and Pakistani Law prostitution / sex service is prohibited in Pakistan.
Please use this forum to initiate a complain and bring such SMS, Websites and Activities to the notice of Authorities / Government and ask them to take appropriate action against such people.
Thanks,
Majid
This is alarming!
Thanks to SMS bundles, dirty minds can get a website running online with less than 10$ investment, or even free – and shoot an SMS to thousands of mobile phone users to market their illicit websites.
With increasing number of broadband users in Pakistan, these unlawful acts and their impacts on general society will go up with time. So this is the time to get things regulated.
Now, if we had a mechanism to block such websites, Majid could have contacted PTA directly to block the website – but alas, PTA is maybe looking at ministry to formulize a website blocking policy that PTA can get implemented.
After the Facebook incident last year, we had heard that PTA was aiming to establish a centralized system to block websites, if reported by users due to their harmful, blasphemous or pornographic nature.
PTA, reportedly, contacted a Chinese vendor in addition to those providing web filtration solutions to Saudi Arabia and UAE, but deal didn't go through. Informed sources tell us that PTA has dropped the idea due to high cost of solution and now it has literally no plan to deal with the situation.
It makes me wonder, why PTA isn't placed anywhere near to getting this solution, which is a technological requirement of society.
PTA must allocate some of the funds it collects from ICT operators (under the head of license fee) to get this internet filtering solution running, where anyone would be able to advise/suggest/report PTA about URLs that they think are offensive/pornographic in nature.
- Those who think it's internet censoring, its not. If someone believes that porn is his/her right to view/read – you're a looser then.
- Those who may argue that proxies and other similar solutions will bypass filters, then these filters will block access to offensive content for the starters at least – they say something better than nothing.
- Those who believe that websites should be blocked at individual level, in fact, we should never visit those websites in first place than looking at PTA to get them blocked: Why there are jails then?
In addition to the web filter we are talking about, government needs to aware the masses about the internet. You will agree that there are many parents (mainly who are above 50 or so) not even aware of this easy availably of explicit content.
And believe me these print ads are not going to do much. Government needs to get the message to the grass root level, through universities, schools, masjids, baithaks and so on.
You will agree that majority of us are not aware of the privacy issues we face in today's age. There are many pictures, videos that end up on internet were usually not intended for the purpose – but they get into dangerous hands due to lack of awareness and things get out of control.
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