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YouTube ban: One year and counting

We have now completed a full year with the YouTube ban in place, forcing some to do without one of the most popular internet sites in the world, many others to resort to proxies of various kinds, putting up with the nuisances these ‘by-pass’ mechanisms cause. So, what has the ban, slapped on after an offensive film was loaded on

Dangerous times

Four months after the US-led attack on Afghanistan, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was abducted in Karachi and beheaded. That was only the first of a large number of murders of journalists we were to see in the coming years. Till a few years ago, no one in the Pakistani media could believe that a journalist’s handcuffed and tortured

Transparency Access

Civic agencies urged to share information with public

KARACHI: Civic agencies should appoint a senior official as a focal person responsible for providing information to the general public, and provision of information be made a rule rather than an exception, said an activist of an NGO working on civic issues. As a rule, the civic agency officials like most of their colleagues in the officialdom, were not very

Authorities fall back on old YouTube advice

ISLAMABAD: While experts are unable to find any way to block unwanted material on social networking website, YouTube, the Ministry of Information and Technology is working on ‘Prevention of Electronic Crimes Bill’ which it considers can pave the way for a localised version of youtube. The bill might take one or two more months to be presented in Parliament and

Pakistan’s ‘cyberwar’ for control of the web

LAHORE: In a dingy Internet cafe, Abdullah gets round the censors with one click and logs onto YouTube, officially banned for a year and at the heart of Pakistan’s cyberwar for control of the web. On September 17, 2012 Islamabad blocked access to the popular video-sharing website after it aired a trailer for a low-budget American film deemed offensive to

Right-to-Information Bill tabled in KPK Assembly

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government on Tuesday tabled ‘Right to Information Bill’ in the provincial assembly while the opposition members walked out from the proceedings in protest against ignoring their demand by the government regarding the District Development Advisory Committee (DDAC). Soon after the recitation from the Holy Quran, newly elected members, including Ahmad Khan Behadar, Jamshid Mohmand from Mardan,

Registration of anti-terrorist case against TV channel against freedom of expression: Senate committee

ISLAMABAD: Expressing its displeasure over registration of a case under anti-terrorist law against a private TV news channel, the Senate Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting Monday directed the Balochistan government to refrain from registration of cases against media. The committee meeting chaired by Senator Kamil Ali Agha said that FIR against a private TV channel over showing video footage

Mobile shop blown up in Charsadda explosion

CHARSADDA: Unidentified militants blew up a mobile shop with explosive material in Charsadda on Monday. The militants had planted a remote-controlled explosive device outside a mobile shop in Sardheri area. The shop, owned by Azizur Rehman, was damaged in the explosion. Bomb Disposal Squad said that one kilogramme of explosive material was used in the attack. Sources said that militants

Journalist threatened to leave Karachi

ISLAMABAD: Faced with threats from the law enforcement agencies, Karachi-based journalist Ali Chishti has been forced to move to the federal capital after being threatened by the Karachi police to leave the city. “Why am I so sure that they were police personnel? Because they had official weapons, official mobiles, and even the way they behaved all matched the typical