The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) on Tuesday restored Wikipedia services across Pakistan on the orders of Premier Shehbaz Sharif.
According to details, Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif earlier directed the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to “immediately” restore the online Encyclopedia, Wikipedia, which was banned for not “blocking/removing sacrilegious content”
The prime minister chaired a committee meeting comprising the law, economic affairs, and information ministers for a “preliminary examination of the matter”.
“Blocking the site in its entirety was not a suitable measure to restrict access to some objectionable contents/ sacrilegious matter on it. The unintended consequences of this blanket ban, therefore, outweigh its benefits,” the statement added.
Remember that Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has blocked Wikipedia services across Pakistan after the free online encyclopedia platform failed to remove blasphemous content.
In a statement, the PTA said that Telecommunication Authority approached Wikipedia to remove the blasphemous content by issuing a notice under applicable law and court order(s).
“The platform neither complied by removing the blasphemous content nor appeared before the Authority,” the statement read.
This is not the first time the authority has taken notice of objectionable content on Wikipedia. In December 2020, PTA issued notices to Google and Wikipedia on account of disseminating sacrilegious content through the platforms.
