Pakistanis marked yet another weekend with disruptions to internet services, particularly major social media platforms.
While disruptions to WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook have become the norm, this week’s outage also impacted Google services, leaving many unable to access their emails or files stored on Google Drive. The few who could access these services reported crippling speeds that made accessing the internet a frustrating and harrowing experience. What makes the situation worse is a lack of clarity on what the government is doing—and what it ultimately hopes to achieve.
Many in local media blame the outages on the “testing” of a national firewall ostensibly aimed at ensuring security. Few believe this. The prevailing consensus holds the outages aim to silence supporters of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, whose presence on social media far exceeds that of any other Pakistani stakeholder.
Rather than acknowledging the problem, Minister of State for Information Technology and Telecommunications Shaza Fatima Khawaja has resorted to gaslighting the public. She maintains any outage is “brief” and rubbishes concerns over the impact of a “national firewall” as “overblown.” She has also defended the ban on X, formerly Twitter, claiming just 2% of Pakistan’s population accesses it. All other platforms, she maintains, are operating at “100%.” This is, generously, a misrepresentation and, more accurately, a bald-faced lie.
Throttling of cellular data has left Pakistani users of WhatsApp—numbering over 50 million—unable to share videos, pictures or even voice notes. Cottage industries are also feeling the pinch, as businesses that offer services through Instagram or Facebook struggle to remain in contact with their customers. Education, particularly at the university-level, is taking another hit, with students unable to access documents and information they need for their studies.
After more than two years of economic misery, Pakistan has slowly started to inch its way back to stability. During this period, the one bright spot for the country—posting regular growth—was its I.T. sector, whose annual exports exceeded $3 billion. The government’s actions pose a direct threat to this. A report from the Overseas Investors Chamber of Commerce and Industry claims internet disruptions have caused 0.57% in direct loss to the country’s GDP this year, roughly Rs. 1.3 billion. Including indirect losses boosts this number to Rs. 1.7 billion.
Shortly after assuming charge as Prime Minister of Pakistan following the 2024 general elections, Shehbaz Sharif had sought a roadmap to boost I.T. exports beyond their existing levels. Every policy adopted by his government since has done little more than strangle the nascent industry, all but insuring that Pakistan will remain in the dark even as the rest of the world continues to advance.