YouTube unblocked in Pakistan after more than 3 years

Photo credit: Rego Korosi

YouTube has been officially banned and blocked in Pakistan since September 2012, after a series of violent protests broke out in response to a film uploaded to YouTube that was deemed blasphemous and derogatory to Muslims.

That changed today with some web users in Pakistan now seeing YouTube is unblocked, though not every internet service provider (ISP) has allowed access to the popular site.

Widespread media reports in the country suggest the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) has officially lifted the restraining order on YouTube. If true, it should be unblocked for everyone in due course.

The nation’s biggest ISP this afternoon posted to Facebook saying “Welcome YouTube.”

A local tech blog says that the offending short film, titled Innocence of Muslims, no longer appears to YouTube viewers in Pakistan even though the film is still available to people outside the country. Instead, a viewer in Pakistan sees a message that reads, “This content is not available on this country domain due to a legal complaint from the government.”

The PTA’s move comes after a motion was filed in the Supreme Court arguing that the reason for the blackout – i.e.: that one specific video – had been eliminated.

Not that innocent

The 14-minute, amateur-made film caused an uproar when it appeared on the web as it makes fun of Islam and touches upon themes of homesexuality and paedophilia. In response to it, protests broke out across the Muslim world, with mobs gathering in Egypt, Bangladesh, and Yemen demanding the video be removed from YouTube and for America – the guy who made it is US-based – to offer an unconditional apology.

In order to prevent mass civil unrest, the Pakistan government decided to block YouTube in the country until a satisfactory solution was found. Google refused to comply to requests for deleting the video altogether, arguing that it didn’t violate its terms of service. Google declined to open a local office in the country or build a local version of YouTube in which controversial content could be censored.

People found myriad ways to circumvent the YouTube ban. Demand for VPN software spiked. But demands for unblocking the site continued to grow.

The lack of access to YouTube did help some local entrepreneurs. A homegrown video site called Tune spiked in popularity, growing to more than 100 million monthly visits.

After almost three and a half years, Google announced earlier this month that it would be launching a Pakistan-specific version of YouTube, paving the way for the ban to be lifted.