Internet Freedom Declines in Pakistan

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The Internet Governance and Digital Rights

Monitor, 2017

Authors
Sadaf Khan
Talal Raza
Waqas Naeem

Editing & Review
Sadaf Khan
Asad Baig

Design and illustrations
Aniqa Haider

Published by Media Matters for Democracy
2018

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Some rights reserved.

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Table of Content

Section I – Internet Rights

Chapter 1 – Zip it – An account of freedom of 7
Expression online

Chapter 2 – Its a private matter – digital technology 15
and challenges to privacy

Chapter 3 – Disconnecting the masses 24

Section II – Internet Governance and Regulation

Chapter 4– The IT Policy – A rights based review 32

Chapter 5 – Pakistan’s Cybercrime Act: From 39
implementation to implications

Section III – Digital Services

Chapter 6 – E-‐Governance in Pakistan: Hopeful Signs for 48
the Future

Chapter 7 – Growth in E-‐commerce shows Promising 60
Signs for Local Digital Services Industry

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Chapter 1
Zip it! -‐ An account of freedom of expression online
Sadaf Khan

The press in Pakistan is no stranger to state censorship. But in recent years the
domain of censorship and restrictions on speech has spread and now, it isn’t just
the press that is subjected to declared and undeclared censorship policies but
activists, political workers, and human rights defenders are all increasingly being
subjected to it. Another concern is that citizens may begin to internalize
perspectives that justify or defend the suppression of truth and dissent. Within this
scenario, the development of a truly democratic discourse remains impossible.

Introduction

The year 2017 saw the disqualification of the Pakistani Prime Minister in a case
initiated on the basis of an investigative journalism project, the Panama Papers.
The Panama Papers and their political fallout became a key factor that influenced
policy decisions regarding the regulation of journalistic and political expression
in the country. Multiple laws, including the controversial cybercrime law,
Pakistan Electronic Crimes Act 2016 and the Anti Terrorism Act, were used to
pressurize journalists and human rights defenders. There were various
incidences of journalists and politically vocal social media users being
approached and intimidated with threats of legal action.

Year 2017 also saw the first instance of mass blocking of news websites along
with multiple social media platforms as the government desperately attempted
to keep proceedings of a public protest under wraps. Attacks on journalists
continued and expanded to include journalists who work primarily for digital
mediums. In addition, there were also instances of journalists being warned to
cease their social media activity. In addition to the punitive use of laws to curb
expression, there were also multiple instances of hate speech and incitement to
violence against those engaged in dissenting speech; the campaign that led to the
murder of a university student Mashal Khan is a case in point.

This chapter outlines the key threats to freedom of expression that emerged in
the year 2017.

Policy & Political Background

Since 9/11 and its security related fallout around the world, Pakistan has
maintained a political narrative that holds ‘security’ as a prime objective
achievable only through a compromise on certain other rights. Over the years,
this narrative has provided justifications for blanket censorship, bans of social
media platforms, crackdowns against vocal activists and media entities, and
network disconnections. It has also received support from a significantly sizeable
section of journalists and activists, who seem to have internalized its principles.
Thus, policies and actions to curb freedom of expression in Pakistan have to be
understood within a political landscape that promotes the sacrifice of some
liberties to ensure security for all.
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Year 2017 was a politically significant year for Pakistan for multiple reasons;
most significantly because of the general elections due in 2018 and the political
aftermath of the release of Panama Papers. Thus the government was involved in
building a structured narrative against digital mediums, in particular social
media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. From statements from the Ministry
of Interior, to court decisions to directives from Pakistan Telecommunication
Authority, PTA, different parts of the legislative, administrative and legal systems
appeared to work together to present digital media as a persistent threat that
had to be railed in.

2017 – moving towards silence

State narratives around social media

The beginning of the year 2017 was demonstrative of the direction this year
would take – within the first week of January 2017, four bloggers went missing1.
Within days of the bloggers’ disappearance, social media posts accusing them of
anti-‐state and anti-‐Islamic activities began surfacing. These were picked up by
the mainstream media too. There was fear among rights activists that upon
return the bloggers would face the “wrath of zealots who want instant justice for
blasphemers”2. Ms. Zohra Yusuf, Chairperson of the Human Rights Commission
of Pakistan, HRCP, also saw this campaign as an effort to ‘lessen sympathy’ for
the bloggers and to ensure that “when the bloggers reappear, there could be a
charge against them”3.

A charge of blasphemy was formally levelled against them through a petition in
Islamabad High court, IHC. However the FIA could find “no evidence” that the
bloggers were engaged in blasphemy and the IHC stated that “the trial court will
decide if this was a case of false accusation or lack of evidence”4.

In March 2017, during the hearing of a related case Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui
of the Islamabad High Court, IHC, stated that blasphemy through social media is
“a greatest form of terrorism and people involved in this heinous act are biggest
terrorists” 5 and ordered the Ministry of Interior to “eliminate access to
blasphemous content on social media, even if it meant blocking “all access to

1 AFP
(2017). Four rights activists gone missing this week. [online] DAWN.COM. Available at:
https://www.dawn.com/news/1307195 [Accessed 20 Apr. 2018].
2 Rumi, R. (2017). Opinion | Bring Pakistan’s Missing Bloggers Home. [online] Nytimes.com.
Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/opinion/bring-‐pakistans-‐missing-‐

bloggers-‐home.html [Accessed 20 Apr. 2018].
3 Tanzeem, A. (2017). Blasphemy Allegations Against Missing Pakistani Bloggers Backfire on Critic.
[online] VOA. Available at: https://www.voanews.com/a/blasphemy-‐allegations-‐against-‐

missing-‐pakistani-‐bloggers-‐backfire-‐critic/3694973.html [Accessed 20 Apr. 2018].
4 DAWN.COM. (2017). No evidence found against bloggers accused of blasphemy, FIA tells court.
[online] Available at: https://www.dawn.com/news/amp/1378262 [Accessed 4 May 2018].

5 Asad, M. (2017). IHC wants blasphemous content on social media blocked. DAWN.COM. Retrieved
8 August 2017, from https://www.dawn.com/news/1319102
9
social media platforms”6. In the decision of Salman Shahid vs Federation of
Pakistan, Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui of IHC commented that government
should try to initiate action to permanently shut down websites and pages that
host blasphemous content7.

In June 2017, an Anti-‐Terrorism Court handed a death sentence to a man for
committing blasphemy over Facebook. This sentence was given under Section
11W of the Anti-‐Terrorism Act with the assertion that blasphemous speech could
‘whip up sectarian hatred’8.

Blasphemous online content remained a topic of debate throughout the year and
consequently social media platforms were frequently presented as anti-‐religious
forums. In fact, the government actively engaged in a campaign to criticise social
media platforms. The Ministry of Interior and the former Minister of Interior
termed social media anti-‐state and dangerous. In a statement issued on May 23,
2017 the Interior Minister said, “our cultural and religious values are under
attack from a section of social media”9. The statement also included a vow to
ensure that “efforts were accelerated to track internet users’ activities online and
hunt down undesirable elements”.

Intimidation of journalists

In 2017, the cyber-‐crime law PECA was used as a tool to intimidate and harass
journalists, activists and other social media users who were engaged in political
commentary on current affairs. The Federal Investigative Agency, FIA, sent
notices to and interrogated various journalists, bloggers and micro-‐bloggers who
were accused of penning anti Army content10. The choice of sections of the law
used to charge these individuals was often bizarre. In a number of cases,
including one of a journalist Zafar Achakzai,11, the FIA brought charges under
Section 21 of PECA12 that defines offenses against modesty of a natural person
and deals largely with creation and abuse of sexually explicit images to
intimidate a person. In other cases the FIA did not issue formal charges and was

6 Shahzad, R. (2017). Blasphemy: IHC directs authorities to block all social media if necessary. The
Express Tribune. Retrieved 8 August 2017, from https://tribune.com.pk/story/1348784/ihc-‐

directs-‐authorities-‐block-‐social-‐media-‐necessary/
7 Salman Shahid vs Federation of Pakistan via Ministry of Interior, Writ Petition739/2017
(Islamabad High Court 2017).

8 Gabol, I. (2017). First death sentence handed to man for blasphemy on social media. DAWN.COM.
Retrieved 1 October 2017, from https://www.dawn.com/news/1338684

9 No restrictions either: No unbridled freedom on social media, says Nisar. (2017). The Express
Tribune. Retrieved 8 August 2017, from https://tribune.com.pk/story/1417195/anti-‐army-‐

content-‐social-‐media-‐will-‐not-‐tolerated-‐chaudhry-‐nisar/
10 FIA traces 12 websites with anti-‐Army content. (2017). The Nation. Retrieved 1 October 2017,
from http://nation.com.pk/national/16-‐May-‐2017/fia-‐traces-‐12-‐websites-‐with-‐anti-‐army-‐
content
11 Shah, S. (2017). Quetta court grants bail to journalist arrested by FIA over 'anti-‐state' social
media posts. DAWN.COM. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from

https://www.dawn.com/news/1343411/quetta-‐court-‐grants-‐bail-‐to-‐journalist-‐arrested-‐by-‐fia-‐
over-‐anti-‐state-‐social-‐media-‐posts
12 Hashim, A. (2017). Pakistan: Zafar Achakzai charged for anti-‐army post. Aljazeera.com.
Retrieved 1 October 2017, from http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/06/pakistan-‐zafar-‐

achakzai-‐charged-‐anti-‐army-‐post-‐170630074828317.html
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allegedly acting under orders from the interior ministry13. This was one of the
few cases of actual arrests but in 2017 at least one journalist reported he was
picked up and interrogated for his social media activity14.

Following a similar attempt by FIA, another journalist, Taha Siddiqui, initiated a
petition in the Islamabad High Court. The journalist was initially contacted by the
Counter Terrorism Department of the agency. During the course of the court
hearing, his case was transferred to the Cyber Crime Wing15 and he was later
asked to visit FIA so that "technical staff may scrutinize his account”. This is
against the procedure defined within the law, which requires the agency to
acquire a warrant before any such logging or scrutinisation can take place.
Siddiqui has since escaped an abduction attempt and relocated to France.

Hate Speech and Incitement

Another way that freedom of expression online was threatened was the use of
structured hate campaigns. In such cases once again blasphemy was used as a
tool of incitement. On April 13, 2017 a 23 year old university student, Mashal
Khan, was murdered by a violent mob charged by accusations that Khan had
conducted blasphemy online16. During investigations that followed the brutal
murder, it became clear that the administration of Mardan University was
involved in provoking the violence against their own student17. Fake screenshots
were used by the perpetrators to incite the mob that killed Khan and mutilated
his dead body. Most parties within the government were not only reluctant to
take action against this brutality but some right wing parties actively tried to rile
up the public sentiment further by connecting murder investigations with
possible amendments in the anti-‐blasphemy law18.

Censorship

The most significant incident of online censorship occurred in November 2017. A
group of religious parties blocked the main entry route to Islamabad and the

13 Rasmussen, S., & Gillani, W. (2017). Pakistan: man sentenced to death for blasphemy on
Facebook. the Guardian. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/11/pakistan-‐man-‐sentenced-‐to-‐death-‐for-‐
blasphemy-‐on-‐facebook
14 Journalist freed after ‘torture’. (2017). DAWN.COM. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from
https://www.dawn.com/news/1344495
15 Journalist Harassed: Case transferred to cyber crime wing -‐ The Express Tribune. (2017). The
ExpressTribune. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from

https://tribune.com.pk/story/1451057/journalist-‐harassed-‐case-‐transferred-‐cyber-‐crime-‐
wing/
16 Akbar, A. and Farhan, H. (2017). Mardan university student lynched by mob over alleged
blasphemy: police. [online] DAWN.COM. Available at: https://www.dawn.com/news/1326729

[Accessed 20 Apr. 2018].
17 Akbar, A. (2017). Lynching suspect gives statement: 'University administration asked me to
testify against Mashal'. DAWN.COM. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from

18 Will cut tongue of anyone wanting to change blasphemy law,' says Jamaat-‐e-‐Islami KP chief.
(2017). The Nation. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from http://nation.com.pk/national/01-‐May-‐

2017/will-‐cut-‐tongue-‐of-‐anyone-‐wanting-‐to-‐change-‐blasphemy-‐law-‐says-‐jamaat-‐e-‐islami-‐kp-‐
chief
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protest threatened to turn violent and ugly19. The protest demonstration labelled
the Faizabad Dharna had been a challenge for the media from the start. Unofficial
advisories to news channels had resulted in an almost total blackout of the
proceedings on mainstream news channels. As a result, public was dependent on
information uploaded and shared by other citizens online. As the protest was at a
major entry point to Islamabad, the lack of information had a direct impact on
the commute and daily routines of citizens. Within this context, the government
eventually issued orders to block news channels, news websites and social media
platforms20 in a desperate attempt to keep the information about an impending
police operation from the public. The only explanation came from Pakistan
Telecommunication Authority, PTA that stated, “social networking websites
Facebook and Twitter and video-‐sharing sites YouTube and Dailymotion would
remain blocked in the country until the law and order situation improved”21.

Other Issues

Pornographic content is banned in the country and falls within the ‘indecent and
immoral’ restrictions defined in the Article 19 of the constitution of Pakistan. In
2017, the crackdown against pornographic content continued. However, the
regulator, PTA, landed in controversy over an ill-‐advised decision to engage a
fifteen year old to make a list of pornographic websites to be blocked. The
teenager Ghazi Muhammad Abdullah, found almost 780,000 adult pages in six
months calling this task his "religious and national” duty22.

The authorities are also on the lookout for websites linked to terrorism. Media
reports suggest that agencies other than the PTA are also involved in monitoring
the internet for terrorism related material. In July 2017, the Punjab Safe Cities
Authority (PSCA) reported “684 objectionable pages and IDs of both Facebook
and Twitter during its strike against anti-‐state, anti-‐social, blasphemous and
sectarian warmongering elements on social media”23. In June 2017, the counter
terrorism department in Sindh had also identified and sought action against “25
such websites, which were involved in spreading religious and ethnic extremism
and terrorism”24.

19 Azeem, M. (2017). Another govt deadline to vacate Faizabad falls on deaf ears. [online]
DAWN.COM. Available at: https://www.dawn.com/news/1372774/another-‐govt-‐deadline-‐to-‐
vacate-‐faizabad-‐falls-‐on-‐deaf-‐ears [Accessed 22 Apr. 2018].
20 Hussain, J. (2017). News channels go off air, Facebook and YouTube blocked in parts of Pakistan.
[online] DAWN.COM. Available at: https://www.dawn.com/news/1372804 [Accessed 22 Apr.

2018].
21 The Express Tribune. (2017). Facebook, Twitter, YouTube to remain blocked until law and order
situation improves: PTA -‐ The Express Tribune. [online] Available at:
https://tribune.com.pk/story/1568051/1-‐twitter-‐reacts-‐faizabad-‐crackdown/ [Accessed 22
Apr. 2018].
22 Crilly, R. (2012). Pakistan uses teenage boy to help with pornography crack
down. Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/9143296/Pakistan-‐uses-‐teenage-‐
boy-‐to-‐help-‐with-‐pornography-‐crack-‐down.html
23 684 social media IDs objectionable. (2017). Thenews.com.pk. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/214986-‐684-‐social-‐media-‐IDs-‐objectionable
24 Ali, I. (2017). CTD seeks ban on 25 websites spreading ‘terrorism, extremism’. DAWN.COM.
Retrieved 1 October 2017, from https://www.dawn.com/news/1341033
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Despite these attempts, various websites that have been actively involved in
recruitment and spread of terrorism or ones being run by proscribed
organisations are still operational. In May 2017, an investigation by the country’s
oldest English newspaper Dawn25 demonstrated the continued presence and
operation of these organisations online. The investigation showed that these
organisations “are present on Facebook in the form of hundreds of pages, groups
and individual user profiles” and enjoyed a collective following of 160,000
people. The investigation also found that the contents of these pages largely
included “hate speech directed at religious minorities and other members of
society”.

Reflections

The year 2017 has been a year of concern for freedom of expression activists in
Pakistan. From the disappearance, torture and vilification of bloggers and
activists in January to the unprecedented ban on news websites and social media
platforms following the coverage of Faizabad Dharna in November, the
government’s policies, actions and narratives have steadily created obstructions
to the exercise of freedom of expression online.

Looking back at 2017, it is obvious that the government, political parties and
other power hubs have all come to recognize the power of social media in setting
political narratives and challenging the status quo. The response to this
recognition has been one of fear and resistance. In the election year, 2018, a
continuation of the measures that were tested in 2017 is already being
witnessed. This might be an attempt to control the political narratives being built
and challenged on social media platforms. The framing of social media platforms
as anti state and anti religion stand to have a direct and significant impact on
political parties using these platforms for their election campaigns. It is
unfortunate that political forces themselves have been too short sighted to see
the folly in their approach and have thus been complicit in the creation of an
environment that threatens democratic discourse in the country.

Breaking the status quo
As the general elections approach, it is important for all stakeholders to play
their roles in challenging the hurdles to the exercise of freedom of expression in
the country. To ensure that the policies and practices governing freedom of
expression in Pakistan adhere to the human rights standards and democratic
requirement, the following recommendations should be considered;

i. Civil society actors should continue to document curbs to freedom of
expression and push back against regressive policies and practices
that threaten this fundamental right.

ii. Media and journalists should stand united against attacks on
journalistic freedoms and cover each incident with an intention to

25 Haque, J., & Bashir, U. (2017). Banned outfits in Pakistan operate openly on
Facebook. DAWN.COM. Retrieved 1 October 2017, from https://www.dawn.com/news/1335561
13
build pressure on government and the state to end impunity and enact
policies that allow requisite journalistic freedoms in the country.

iii. Media and civil society actors should collaborate to initiate measures
that promote awareness amongst the masses regarding the
importance of digital mediums as modes of expression, so that public
pressure can be built for progressive policymaking on the same.

iv. The government should revise policies like those included in PECA
2016 that allow law enforcement and other authorities to misuse their
powers without accountability.

v. Political parties should recognize the importance of digital and social
media and ensure that their manifestos are cognizant of the
importance of these mediums and are able to respond to the
challenges that hamper political and democratic discourse on these
mediums.

vi. All stakeholders should engage in productive dialogue to ensure that
the challenges posed by social media platforms and alternate
information sources are understood and tackled collaboratively and to
ensure that each stakeholder is working towards improving the
practice of freedom of expression online.

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Chapter 2
Its a Private Matter
Sadaf Khan and Talal Raza

Introduction

Pakistan’s constitution explicitly recognizes the right to privacy. The article 14 of
the constitution confirms that “the dignity of man and, subject to law, the privacy
of home, shall be inviolable”. 26

Furthermore, Pakistan has also ratified international covenants including
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the Convention
on the Rights of the Child that uphold the right to privacy. Furthermore, Pakistan
has also signed Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam that also upholds
right to privacy. 27

With the rise in internet penetration, internet users are increasingly facing
challenges to their privacy in the form of data breaches and data loss. Consumer
Data has never been more vulnerable in Pakistan than today. There have been
many instances where consumer data was compromised and exposed owing to
vulnerabilities in information systems of corporations and government agencies.
Yet, no substantive measures have been taken to protect consumers’ data.

Unfortunately, only a handful of data breaches reach the national news or are
discussed in the mainstream media. This is owing to the sensitivities attached to
such revelations. However, it is clear that personal data is extremely vulnerable
in Pakistan. The problem is reflected by how casually data gets processed to
track down the exact location and information of Individuals.

Policy & Political Background

Pakistan signed the open government partnership, OGP in 2017, expressing
commitment to “transparency, good governance and fighting corruption” 28 .
Among the commitments made as a part of the OGP workplan, the ministry of
information technology also committed to table data protection law29 in the
national assembly. The workplan-‐ that is yet to be made public 30 and the
ministry is lagging behind schedule on the initiation of public consultations on
drafting the bill.

26 Privacy International, Stakeholder Report Universal Periodic 28th Session: The Right to Privacy in the Islamic Republic
of Pakistan (London: Privacy International).

27 Ibid.
28 Finance Minister’s Speech at the Inauguration of the National Workshop on OGP. (2017).
[ebook] p.1. Available at: http://www.finance.gov.pk/press/Speech_OGP_27072017.pdf

[Accessed 4 May 2018].
29 The Express Tribune. (2017). Need stressed to introduce data protection laws -‐ The Express
Tribune. [online] Available at: https://tribune.com.pk/story/1578862/1-‐need-‐stressed-‐

introduce-‐data-‐protection-‐laws/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
30 Media Matters for Democracy has been a part of the consultations held by the government as a part of developing
the OGP workplan and has submitted recommendations before the finalization of these commitments.
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The lack of a data protection law is not the only policy challenge that affects the
privacy rights of citizens of Pakistan. The Prevention of Electronic Crime Act
2016, PECA2016, doesn’t contain appropriate protection mechanisms for
citizens. On the other hand, PECA does create space for abuse of power by
authorities by defining a mechanism for real time surveillance that has been
substantially weakened from the mechanisms originally defined in the Right of
Fair Trial Act.

Instead of strengthening a sense of data protection, PECA2016 appears to further
compromise it. For example, under PECA2016, it is mandatory for telecom and
internet service providers to retain data for at least 90 days, but does not define
any SOPs regarding the safeguard of this data from theft or misuse.

Although the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom in Pakistan insists
that there are sections in the legislation that prevented misuse of data. One
official shared that the section 41 of the PECA prevented misuse of personal
data.31 According to section 41 of PECA, any service provider/authorized officer
(of FIA) will be imprisoned for three years or fined up to one million Rupees, or
both, for unlawfully, and without consent, disclosing data containing a person’s
personal information, with the “intent to cause or knowing that he is likely to
cause harm, wrongful loss or gain to any person or compromise confidentiality of
such material or data.”32
However, this provision does not comprehensively address the issues related to
data protection and does not set up any autonomous body to investigate data
breaches. Rather, it is the Federal Investigation agency that will deal with data
breach just like any other crime.

Digital data safety – an oxymoron in Pakistan?

In 2017, we have witnessed multiple instances where the state or private entities
like telecom operators and banks faced data thefts and leaks and were able to get
away without any legal repercussions or even without having to inform the
customers about the exact nature of these leaks.

Pakistani consumers’ data and foreign entities

One of the biggest privacy related scandals of 2017 was the resurfacing of a 2011
WikiLeak that disclosed that UK and US governments might have had access to
the citizen’s data held by National Database and Registration Authority,
NADRA33. Assange claimed that “a front company, the International Identity
Services, was set up in the UK and hired as consultants for NADRA to “squirrel
out data for all of Pakistan”34.

31 MOITT Senior official, personal communication, October 25, 2017.
32 Parliament of Pakistan, The Gazette of Pakistan (Islamabad: Parliament of Pakistan, 2016), 765.
33 Propakistani.pk. (2017). US and UK Had Access to NADRA Database: Wikileaks. [online]
Available at: https://propakistani.pk/2017/06/07/us-‐uk-‐access-‐nadra-‐database-‐wikileaks/
34 The Express Tribune. (2017). WikiLeaks tweets reminder that 'US and UK had stolen NADRA
records' -‐ The Express Tribune. [online] Available at:
17

WikiLeaks also claimed that then Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani allegedly
suggested this route to make citizen’s private data available to the U.S. without
potential embarrassment to his party, the Pakistan Peoples’ Party. NADRA has
issued a statement in 2011 denying these allegations and stated its database
“cannot be replicated or shared with any country or entity no matter what the
individual’s authority or position requesting to compromise NADRA records
is”35. However, there have been multiple instances where claims of access to and
hacking of NADRA’s data have been made by local36 and foreign hackers 37 .
NADRA also faced allegations of having “shared database of millions of
Pakistanis with a private company that was awarded a contract in 2009 for the
issuance of the National Smart Card Foreigner Identity Pakistan (NICOP) and
Pakistan Origin Card (POC) in the UK and Europe”38, however all allegations
were officially denied. What is problematic in this context is a lack of a
mechanism through which citizens can formally request access to details about
these allegations that result in a complete lack of transparency and
accountability.

Another blow to Pakistani consumers’ data privacy came in the shape of a reveal
by Hacker group ShadowBrokers, who revealed “information detailing how the
agency [NSA] accessed private and public networks in other countries”39. The
data showed how NSA accessed and monitored Mobilink consumers’ data in
Pakistan. Mobilink’s chief technical Officer Khalid Shehzad, talking to the media
on the issue simply said that” the NSA leaks were related to Mobilink and
referred to 2006 and had no implications today.”40 The assertion that simply
because the information that surfaced in 2017 relates to a data security breach
that occurred in 2006 is irrelevant is astounding and alarming.

https://tribune.com.pk/story/1429538/wikileaks-‐tweets-‐reminder-‐us-‐uk-‐stolen-‐nadra-‐
records/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
35 Tikhonova, P. (2017). The U.S. And U.K. Stole Data Of Pakistan Citizens [ANALYSIS]. [online]
ValueWalk. Available at: https://www.valuewalk.com/2017/06/us-‐uk-‐stole-‐pakistan-‐nadra-‐

data/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
36 Atta, A. (2013). Official Website of NADRA E-‐Sahulat Gets Hacked, User Data Compromised.
[online] Propakistani.pk. Available at: https://propakistani.pk/2013/09/16/official-‐website-‐of-‐

nadra-‐e-‐sahulat-‐gets-‐hacked-‐user-‐data-‐compromised/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
37 Baloch, F. (2012). Cyber vandalism: Turkish hacker claims gaining access to NADRA, FIA servers -‐
The Express Tribune. [online] The Express Tribune. Available at:

https://tribune.com.pk/story/480044/cyber-‐vandalism-‐turkish-‐hacker-‐claims-‐gaining-‐access-‐
to-‐nadra-‐fia-‐servers/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
38 Lack of accountability in NADRA. (2017). [ebook] Lahore: Digital Rights Foundation. Available
at: https://digitalrightsfoundation.pk/wp-‐content/uploads/2017/06/NADRA-‐breaches-‐
Infographic-‐Updated.pdf [Accessed 4 May 2018].
39 The Express Tribune. (2017). NSA hacked Pakistani mobile networks: WikiLeaks -‐ The Express
Tribune. [online] Available at: https://tribune.com.pk/story/1378909/nsa-‐hacked-‐pakistani-‐

mobile-‐networks-‐wikileaks/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
40 DAWN.COM. (2017). NSA hacked Pakistani mobile system: WikiLeaks. [online] Available at:
https://www.dawn.com/news/1326152 [Accessed 4 May 2018].
18
ATM skimming and loss of banking data

ATM skimming i.e. the theft of financial data of ATM users remained an issue all
through 2017. In most cases Chinese hackers were found to be involved in the
skimming scandals. A number of skimming incidents occurred in Karachi and the
FIA’s cybercrime wing initiated investigations following “complaints by the
Habib Bank Limited which acknowledged that around 600 customers across the
country have lost close to Rs. 10 million in the cyber attack.”41 Following these
incidents, a number of Chinese nationals were arrested for installing skimming
devices and running related networks42.

In an interview with Digital Rights Monitor, Imran Saeed Rana, the deputy
director of FIA and officer-‐in-‐charge of National Response Center for Cyber
Crimes Rawalpindi and Islamabad shared that “there has been an increase of
50.3%. He further said that in the year 2016, 375 million transactions were made
through ATMs in Pakistan of nearly 4.3 trillion rupees, out of which 35,000
transactions were “bogus” which resulted in a loss of half a billion rupees.”43

Speaking to Digital Rights Monitor, a consumer of Habib Bank , one of the banks
worst hit by the ATM skimming racket, said that her ATM card had been
disabled by the bank following the attack. She said that the bank simply informed
the customers that they were investigating a data leak and ATM cards that had
been previously used in any of the hacking locations were being disabled as a
caution. However, there was no clarity on the nature and extent of the threat and
the bank remained ambiguous about the measures being taken to protect
consumer data in future.

Banks were not the only corporate entities which showed a disregard for
consumer’s right to know with regards to the privacy and possible compromise
of their data.

Corporates and companies escape liability in cases on consumer data
breaches

Digital Rights Monitor reported about a cyber attack at Telenor, one of Pakistan’s
biggest telecom operators. According to sources within Telenor, employees of
the Telecommunication giant received an email with the subject line
“confidential”. The email informed the recipients that “the attachment was a new
policy guideline from Ministry of Information Technology [MOITT] regarding IT

41 The Express Tribune. (2017). Beware -‐ hackers are going after ATMs in Pakistan -‐ The Express
Tribune. [online] Available at: https://tribune.com.pk/story/1574702/2-‐beware-‐hackers-‐going-‐

atms-‐pakistan/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
42 Geo.tv. (2017). Hundreds of Pakistanis lose millions in major ATM skimming fraud. [online]
Available at: https://www.geo.tv/latest/170648-‐hundreds-‐of-‐karachiites-‐lose-‐millions-‐in-‐

major-‐atm-‐skimming-‐fraud [Accessed 4 May 2018].
43 Khan, A. (2017). Fraudulent transactions through ATM machines and related crimes have
doubled: Officer-‐in-‐charge NR3C (Islamabad/Rawalpindi). [online] Digital Rights Monitor.

Available at: http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/fraudulent-‐transactions-‐through-‐atm-‐machines-‐
and-‐related-‐crimes-‐have-‐doubled-‐from-‐last-‐year-‐officer-‐in-‐charge-‐nr3c-‐islamabad-‐rawalpindi/
19
security. As soon as the recipient clicked on the attachment, the embedded trojan
code automatically forwarded the email to contacts within Telenor using the
recipient’s email address. The sources also revealed that as a result of clicking on
the attachment, numerous computers were infected. Sources also shared that the
victim’s social and email accounts were all compromised while the trojan was
able to retrieve data from the computers, simultaneously installing a key-‐logger
in the process.”44

While multiple sources within Telenor confirmed this attack, Telenor Pakistan’s
Director Corporate Communications Areej Khan only said that some “unusual
activity on some of our personnel machines” was reported and that the company
had taken “all necessary actions”.

Once again, none of the Telenor consumers were informed about this incident
and had no knowledge that their data might have been compromised in this
security breach.

This callous attitude of corporate entities towards consumer data has been
documented across sectors. Last year, property dealing giant zameen.com and
Pakistan’s most popular online car retail space PakWheels45 had also suffered
data thefts that compromised consumer data, but did not have to face any legal
consequences for their failure to protect customer’s information.

This lack of legal structure to protect consumer data and hold data hosting
companies and corporates liable has led to an extremely careless attitude
towards consumer data. A DRM investigation into the protection / privacy of
data held by call centres of fast food giants like KFC, McDonald and Pizza Hut
revealed that it is extremely easy for anyone to access sensitive information like
home and office addresses saved with food delivery hotlines46.

The government’s indifference towards consumer data is also apparent in the
fact that there are no efforts being made at the state level to raise public
awareness about the implications of data thefts. Meanwhile, the government
itself has issued warnings within its own quarters advising against the “use of
social media applications especially “WhatsApp” as they sent user information
without their intervention to abroad servers.47
The question of illegal access by state agencies

44 Raza, T. (2017). Telenor Pakistan comes under a cyber-‐attack; the extent of damage remains
unclear. [online] Digital Rights Monitor. Available at: http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/telenor-‐

pakistan-‐comes-‐under-‐a-‐cyber-‐attack-‐the-‐extent-‐of-‐damage-‐remains-‐unclear/ [Accessed 4 May
2018].
45 The Express Tribune. (2017). PakWheels.com hacked, over half million accounts compromised -‐
The Express Tribune. [online] Available at: https://tribune.com.pk/story/1280485/pakwheels-‐

com-‐hacked-‐0-‐6-‐million-‐accounts-‐compromised/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
46 Raza, T. (2017). No one to protect digital identity: how vulnerable is consumer data in Pakistan?.
[online] Digital Rights Monitor. Available at: http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/no-‐one-‐to-‐protect-‐

digital-‐identity-‐how-‐vulnerable-‐is-‐consumer-‐data-‐in-‐pakistan/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
47 Khan, A. (2017). Govt warns officials WhatsApp, other mobile apps risky. [online] Digital Rights
Monitor. Available at: http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/govt-‐warns-‐officials-‐whatsapp-‐other-‐

mobile-‐apps-‐risky/ [Accessed 4 May 2018].
20

The question about data theft and illegal data access by state agencies is difficult
to document. MMfD team members came across a number of anecdotes where in
journalists and political workers claimed that they had been harassed by FIA and
made to hand over access to their digital communication devices, however,
neither did they take any legal action against this abuse of power, nor were these
incidents reported in the media. Given the history of abuse of power within
Pakistan’s law enforcement agency and the fact that the Prevention of Electronic
Crimes Act, 2016, does not include necessary and effective provisions for data
protection, the chances of these allegations being true are high. One of the rare
cases that were reported was of journalist Taha Siddiqui who was approached by
the FIA’s counter terrorism wing in May 2017, initially without a written order.
The journalist initially received a phone call directing him to appear in FIA
headquarters for interrogation. He was also instructed to bring his devices. He
refused on the basis of irregularity of this notice and eventually filed a petition in
Islamabad High Court. All in all, the record of irregular and /or illegal access to
digital data by law enforcement agencies using PECA2016 is still largely
anecdotal and difficult to substantiate.

Is the establishment of a Privacy Commission the answer?

The situation is well reflective of the need to set up an independent privacy
commission that has the independence and authority to tackle threats to citizen’s
privacy. However, this is not going to be an easy challenge.

Challenges to the establishment of Privacy Commission in Pakistan:

One of the biggest challenges to establishment of Privacy Commission in
Pakistan is the complete lack of sole data protection legislation, on which the
Commission would be able to work against. . Although, the government made
open promises to introduce such law, to both parliamentarians, and to civil
society, the realities are different.

Recently, Senator Farhatullah Babar gave an interview in which he noted that the
government had promised introducing data protection law within six months
after enactment of cybercrime act. Although, the cybercrime act (PECA) came
into effect in August 2016, the Senator was unaware that no work on the initial
draft had commenced. 48
Separately, officials within Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom

admitted that the bill will not be ready any time soon, and separately, another
official went on to even suggest that the draft bill was not even thoroughly
discussed by the government agencies. One official did suggest that the public
consultation might open in early 2018. With elections scheduled to be held in
mid-‐2018, the state machinery’s sole focus would be to prepare for elections.49
Already, there had been reports that the Minister of State Anusheh Rehman was
not giving due time to the Ministry. Being an advocate, she is engrossed in
fighting the political battles for the family of his party’s political elite, the Sharifs.

48 Senator Farhatullah Babar, personal communication, October 15, 2017.
49 MOITT official, personal communication.
21
The President of her ruling party Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was recently
deposed from the office of Prime Minister on corruption charges. There are also
cases looming against not only Mr. Sharif but his children.50

In the midst of this political instability and looming general elections, the officials
indirectly acknowledged that the adoption of data protection bill could be
further delayed till late 2018 or early 2019. Without a data protection law, no
privacy commission can be set up.

Reflections

In addition to the instances reported here, there were also rumours about
various incidents of scammers collecting bio metric data from people in order to
get illegal mobile SIMS. Since the registration of SIM phone has been linked to
biometrics, biometric verification machines, connected to NADRA’s database
have propped up all over the country. These machines are easily available to
both licensed and unlicensed businesses and we have seen various operating on
roadside stalls, verifying biometrics and issuing SIM cards. Following this
scammers were said to visit villages and suburban areas with large illiterate
population and getting their biometrics as a part of a fraudulent ‘awards
scheme’. The mainstream media did not report on these incidents.

This demonstrates the need for creating awareness among the public about the
value of their personal information. A vast population of the public is just getting
connected and does not have an understanding of the value of their private
information and isn’t aware of the issues that biometric data in the wrong hands
can create.

One key issue is the inability of the media to report on data breaches and unsafe
data practices at the hands of large businesses and corporations as the same
organizations also advertise on the media, thus creating a conflict of interest.

The lack of transparency about policies and procedures that are in place to
secure state owned databanks holding public’s data is also concerning. Under
safe city projects thousands of CCTV cameras are now collecting public’s data.
The National Database and Registration Authority holds tremendous amounts of
data. The linkage of phone SIMS with biometric data has also opened a
completely different avenue for mass amounts of data collection. In this scenario,
the absence of a law to protect the public from potential abuse and misuse of this
data, makes the public vulnerable to serious violations of its right to privacy.

There is also the issue of alleged misuse of the cybercrime law, PECA 2016 and
second the lax attitude taken by the government towards genuine incidents of
data compromise at the hands of private entities. The abuse of law is something
that was anticipated and protested by civil society activists even as the draft of
cybercrime law lay in the parliament. However, the ministry of information

50 Geo News Correspondent Azam Khan, personal communication, November 01, 2017.
22
technology and the legislators chose to ignore civil society voices. As a result, the
law does not contain appropriate penalties for those involved in abusing this
law. Consequently, in 2017, FIA officers were involved in attaining access to user
data by merely citing the law [orally] without showing any warrants. This
tendency to abuse power is neither new not surprising. There is need for
appropriate amendments in PECA that ensure that any authority figure involved
in the abuse of power can be legally held liable.

Recommendations

The threats to privacy are inherent in a digital economy. As public and private
bodies move towards the introduction of digital services and more and more
people connect to the Internet, it becomes urgent to create protection
mechanisms to support citizens of the country. To ensure that the appropriate
legislative and policy actions are taken;

1. Civil society actors should continue to advocate for the enactment of data
protection law in the country.

2. Civil society actors, including the media should initiate the discussion on
the formation of a Privacy Commission that is independent and
empowered to provide redressal in cases of privacy violations.

3. Media and journalists should cover the issue of data security and privacy
and work to create general public awareness on the issue.

4. Media and civil society actors should monitor and report on the
implementation of the OGP workplan, in particular IT ministry’s
commitment to initiate a public consultation process for the drafting of
data protection law.

5. Media and civil society actors should continue to document violations of
privacy, including misuse and loss of consumer data by corporate entities.

6. The government should introduce laws and necessary mechanisms to
ensure that corporations and other ventures follow strict regulations
when collecting and securing consumer data.

7. The government should fulfill its commitment regarding the initiation of
public consultations on data protection law.

23

24
Chapter 3
‘Disconnecting’ the masses
Talal Raza and Asad Baig

Pakistan’s mobile industry is growing at a rapid pace. Currently, there are 148
million mobile subscribers which makes around 77% of Pakistan’s population;
51 million have also subscribed to 3G and 4G mobile internet services.51

With the rise in the number of mobile subscribers, the demand side of digital
services is growing and as a result, digital businesses and startups are taking
roots. A good example would be the local ride hailing service Careem, which
quite possibly has become one of the most popular digital services of Pakistan.
Similarly, mobile internet is the life-‐force for many young startups.

However, the digital life of most mobile subscribers comes to a unexpected halt
during arbitrary network shutdowns — temporary suspension of mobile
services often in the pretext of security and maintaining law and order.

In one year, citizens of Pakistan may face anywhere from 6 to 10 or even more
partial and/or complete network shutdowns, varying in scale and intensity.
Some are localised to a city or a neighbourhood, while some can span the whole
province — or more than one — and can last for a day or more.

Over the past one year, there have been at least seven different occasions where
mobile networks including the mobile internet services were suspended. In
some districts of Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas, mobile
internet services remain suspended even after a year. History has taught us that
the government may or may not notify the citizens in advance before shutting
down the networks and often people find themselves stranded, caught off guard,
by a surprise network shutdown. The officials of Pakistan Telecommunication
Authority (PTA) mostly refrain from issuing statement, and often share the
reasons of unannounced network shutdowns off the record, pointing fingers to
the law enforcement agencies.

Here is a timeline of some of the network shutdowns that occurred in 2017 and
were reported in media:

● Since February 2017, mobile internet is suspended in various districts of
Balochistan including Pishin, Killa Abdullah, Dalbandin and Kalat keeping
in view the security concerns at the request of law enforcement
agencies.52 While there are reports that mobile internet is restored in
Dalbandin, locals have reported that it remains suspended in other
parts.53

51 “Telecom Indicators”, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, accessed April 18, 2018,
https://www.pta.gov.pk//en/telecom-‐indicators
52 Talal Raza, “Living off the grid: practicing journalism in Baluchistan without mobile internet”,
Digital Rights Monitor, November 06, 2017, accessed April 18, 2018,
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/living-‐off-‐the-‐grid-‐practicing-‐journalism-‐in-‐baluchistan-‐without-‐
mobile-‐internet
53 Local residents, personal communication.
25

● On March 19, 2017, cellular services were briefly suspended in parts of
Rawalpindi and Islamabad ahead of a military parade on March, 23 2017,
commemorated as the ‘Pakistan Day’ in the remembrance of the Pakistan
resolutions passed on the same date in 1940.54 On March 23, the cellular
services were suspended again for a few hours.55

● On September 29-‐October 01, 2017, mobile phone services including the
mobile internet were suspended in the wake of Ashura processions.
According to the Digital Rights Monitor various cities across Pakistan
including Karachi, Hyderabad, Shaheed Benazirabad, Khairpur, Sukkur,
Larkana, Shikarpur, Jaccobabad, Faisalabad, Sialkot, Bhukkar, Quetta,
Mach, Bolan, Sibi, Jhal Magsi, Naseerabad, Jaffarabad, Dera Murad Jamali,
Dera Allah Yar and Peshawar were affected. The move was made to avoid
untoward ‘security situation’ according to the official notifications.56

● On October 23, 2017, mobile services were suspended in parts of
Rawalpindi/Islamabad to facilitate a musical concert organised by
Pakistan army. The musical concert was organised for the participants of
“Pakistan Motor Rally” at the Parade Ground. No notification was issued
by PTA prior to blocking the services.57

● Between November 09, 2017 and November 15, 2017, mobile and
internet services were suspended at Faizabad and adjacent areas owing
to protest camp of Tehreek e Labaik ya Rasulallah. Sector I-‐8 and
Faizabad were most affected. No official notification was issued. Later on
November 25-‐26, mobile internet, popular social media sites including
Facebook and Twitter and 22 news websites were taken down to
maintain law and order for more than 30 hours. No official notification
was issued.

● On November 30, 2017 it was reported that mobile phone services were
suspended in three cities of Sindh including Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur
and Quetta in wake of security concerns around route of processions of
Rabiul Awal for a few hours. These suspensions were made at the request
of Sindh and Balochistan home departments respectively. 58

54 “Blackout of Mobile Phone Services irks Islamabad, Pindi residents,” Dawn.com, March 20,
2017, accessed April 18, 2018, https://www.dawn.com/news/1321565
55 Ibid.
56 Asad Baig, Cellular and Internet Services remained suspended in various cities across Pakistan
in the wake of Ashura; GSM tracker enabled cars stranded; millions affected,” Digital Rights
Monitor, October 02, 2018, accessed March 26, 2018, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/cellular-‐
and-‐internet-‐services-‐remained-‐suspended-‐in-‐various-‐cities-‐across-‐pakistan-‐in-‐the-‐wake-‐of-‐
ashura-‐gsm-‐tracker-‐enabled-‐cars-‐stranded-‐millions-‐affected
57Talal Raza, “Mobile network shutdown in parts of Rawalpindi/Islamabad due to a ‘musical
concert’,” October 23, 2017, accessed March 26, 2018, Digital Rights Monitor,
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/mobile-‐network-‐shutdown-‐in-‐parts-‐of-‐rawalpindiislamabad-‐
due-‐to-‐musical-‐concert
58 Ibid.
26

● On March 19, 2018 mobile phone services were again suspended as part
of military parade celebrations for March23, the Pakistan Day. Later on
March 23, cellular services were suspended again for four hours.59

Living through the network shutdowns

Mobile communications have become an integral part of our daily lives and in
today’s digital world, the inability to communicate can be fatal. Shahtaj, a young
girl from Rawalpindi found herself in a similar predicament when, during an
ongoing network shutdown, she was injured in a road accident. Unable to call the
emergency services or inform her friends and family, she had to wait on the
roadside. She eventually fainted as a result of excessive bleeding. 60

Similarly, people were stranded, unable to start their cars installed with GSM
trackers during the network shutdowns. A representative of a Karachi based
GSM tracker company confirmed the possibility of cars getting stranded, unable
to start, due to the suspension of cellular services, reported Digital Rights
Monitor. 61

Particularly, in certain areas of Balochistan such as Qillah Abdullah, where
mobile internet is the primary way of connecting to the Internet, journalists find
it extremely difficult to report their stories to headquarters.62

Network shutdowns, the new normal

Network suspensions became the norm ten years ago at a time when Pakistan
was battling with terrorism. Such were the state of affairs that terrorist attacks
happened almost on a weekly basis. Religious gatherings and processions,
especially around the Ashura, were most vulnerable to terrorists attacks.
Evidence revealed that some of these attacks were carried out using mobile
devices.

In an attempt to prevent similar attacks, the authorities opted for temporary
suspension of mobile phone services especially during high profile gatherings in
parts of the country especially around special occasions with a probability of
large gatherings.

59 Talal Raza, “Mobile Phone Services suspended briefly suspended in parts of Rawalpindi,
Islamabad, restored after Four hours,”Digital Rights Monitor, March 23, 2018, accessed April 18,
2018, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/mobile-‐phone-‐services-‐briefly-‐suspended-‐in-‐parts-‐of-‐
rawalpindi-‐islamabad-‐restored-‐after-‐four-‐hours
60 Zak Rogoff, “ #KeepItOn: Pakistanis have long suffered from Internet Shutdowns: At last, their
voices are being heard,” Access Now, February 28, 2018, accessed April 18, 2018,
https://www.accessnow.org/pakistanis-‐long-‐suffered-‐internet-‐shutdowns-‐last-‐voices-‐heard
61 Asad Baig, “Cellular and Internet services remained suspended in various cities across Pakistan
in the wake of Ashura; GSM tracker enabled cars stranded; millions affected”, Digital Rights
Monitor, October 2, 2017, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/cellular-‐and-‐internet-‐services-‐
remained-‐suspended-‐in-‐various-‐cities-‐across-‐pakistan-‐in-‐the-‐wake-‐of-‐ashura-‐gsm-‐tracker-‐
enabled-‐cars-‐stranded-‐millions-‐affected/
62 Talal Raza, “Living off the grid.”
27

Initially, these shutdowns were restricted to parts of Balochistan. However, by
2012, they became more frequent across Pakistan. Over the years, the practice of
shutting down communications became a new normal on almost every occasion
or event of prominence.

While Pakistan has come a long way from incidents of active terrorism, but it
seems that the practice of shutting down communications has caught on. The
government officials and the law enforcement agencies, it seems, find ‘peace of
mind’ by suspending communications around the potentially high-‐profile
occasions and events; since there is no actual evidence available to suggest the
impact of these shutdowns on thwarting terrorist attacks.

The cost of network shutdowns

Digital Rights Monitor looked in to the figures made available by Pakistan
Telecommunication Authority, PTA. The combined revenue generated by mobile
phone companies in Pakistan for fiscal year 2016-‐17 was 369,118 million PKR.
According to these figures, the mobile phone companies combined, generated
nearly a billion PKR per day in revenue, which calculates to nearly 42 million per
hour. Considering there are 147 million mobile phone subscribers in Pakistan,
each subscriber has to contribute nearly .25 PKR to make up this revenue.

Based on this rudimentary calculation, a localised network shutdown in
Islamabad, a relatively smaller city of Pakistan, would cost around 284,000 PKR
/ hour in revenue to mobile phone companies.

These estimates, albeit not accurate or official, give one an idea of revenue loss
on a daily basis during network shutdowns. However, neither the governments
nor the mobile phone companies come clean about the loss of revenue with
official figures.

Fighting on a legal front to keep it on

Fortunately there has been positive development in pushing back on network
shutdowns. In 2016, four residents of Islamabad filed a petition in Islamabad
High Court through Advocate Umer Gilani challenging the legality of network
shutdowns under Telecommunication Re-‐Organisation Act 1996. The federal
government defended the act of shutting down communications temporarily
under Section 54 Subsection 3, albeit the section is only application under the
imposition of ‘emergency’.

On February 28, 2018 Islamabad High Court declared the network shutdowns
illegal. The court noted that the cellular suspension by the government under
PTA’s section 54 (3), under the pretext of law and order and national security,
was in contradiction with the Constitution. It stated that section 54(3) allowed
28
government to shut down cellular services in emergency situation proclaimed by
President.63

While the decision was hailed by rights activists, the government filed an intra-‐
court appeal with the three member bench of Islamabad High Court on March 17,
2018, just ahead of the March 23 celebrations of Pakistan Day, one of the
occasions on which the networks are traditionally suspended. On March 20, the
bench granted an “interim” stay against the earlier decision thereby allowing
government to suspend mobile phone services. The interim stay is valid till the
next hearing in May. 64

Going beyond the shutdowns

On July 1, 2016, the U.N. Human Rights Council condemned all “measures to
intentionally prevent or disrupt access to or dissemination of information
online,” and called on governments worldwide to desist and refrain from such
practices65. David Kaye, the UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression
holds that ongoing shutdowns “contradict the human rights commitments that
governments have made” at the HRC66.

To ensure that this violation of citizen’s right to connect, express and access
information does not continue, it is important that;

i. The government should recognise the fallacy in the argument that
equates network shutdowns with security and acknowledge the fact
that disconnecting citizens simply leads to increased vulnerability of
the citizens.

ii. The government should ensure that any orders for network
disconnection are given only in cases where the threat of terrorism is
imminent and verified.

iii. Both government and corporations should ensure that telecom
consumers are made aware of any imminent / planned shutdowns
well in advance.

iv. Corporates should abide by the UN Guiding Principals on Business and
Human Rights. In particular they should try to address the adverse

63 “Islamabad High Court declares Network Shutdowns Illegal,” Digital Rights Monitor, February
26, 2018, accessed April 18, 2018, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/islamabad-‐high-‐court-‐

declares-‐government-‐network-‐shutdown-‐illegal
64 Talal Raza, “Islamabad High Court allows Government to suspend Mobile Phone services,
grants ‘Interim’ Stay till May,” March 20, 2018, accessed April 18, 2018,
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/government-‐files-‐appeal-‐against-‐ihc-‐order-‐on-‐cellular-‐network-‐
shutdowns-‐bench-‐reserves-‐verdict
65 Human Rights Council Resolution 32/13
66 David Kaye, UNSR FoE, Report to 35th Session of UNHRC
29
human rights impacts of shut downs67, at least by making sure that
their consumers are made aware of any imminent disconnection. ,
including the time and location of the shutdown.

v. Civil Society actors including activists and legal fraternity should
continue to engage with policy makers and legal processes to ensure
that state policy towards network disconnections is discussed in its
entirety and a discourse for requisite policy changes can be developed.

67 Guiding Principiles on Business and Human Rights (p. 18) available via
http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Publications/GuidingPrinciplesBusinessHR_EN.pdf last
accessed 19.03.18
30

31

32
Chapter 4
Pakistan’s IT Policy: A rights based review
Talal Raza

The United Nations has recognised the importance of Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) and endorsed its significance in the
development through various forms. For instance, the Sustainable Development
Goal (SDG) 9 urges states to “significantly increase access to information and
communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable
access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020.”68

Meanwhile, in a separate resolution passed in June 2016, the United Nations
Human Rights Council (UNHRC) condemned the efforts to censor online content
and disrupt internet recognising that people have same rights online as they
have offline.69

Pakistan’s Internet landscape is expanding at a rapid pace. At the moment, more
than 50 million citizens have access to the Internet.70 Naturally, the IT industry
has expanded with the expansion of the Internet. Figures from the government
suggest that there are more than 2000 IT companies and call centres and more
than 20,000 IT graduates produced every year.71

A number of services such as online shopping, ride haling and e-‐banking are
increasingly integrating in the urban culture of Pakistan. Furthermore, the
popularity of social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter has
encouraged entrepreneurs, journalists, activists and politicians to use these
services to reach a wider audience.

There have been instances where the platforms have played an important role in
highlighting issues that are ignored by the traditional media. Given the current
state of self-‐censorship being exercised by the mainstream media on certain
thorny political and policy issues, social media platforms have been instrumental
in shedding light on the matters such as the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement, which
were otherwise blacked out.

However, these opportunities have also met with certain challenges.
Internet access is frequently disrupted to pursue security objectives. Social
media pages and accounts are taken down in collaboration with corporations
and activists/journalists are finding it difficult to communicate with their
sources and peers using secure communication tools. Free expression in general

68 Goal
9: Build resilient Infrastructure, promote sustainable Industrialization and foster
Innovation,” UN Sustainable Development Goals, accessed April 18, 2018,
https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/infrastructure-‐industrialization/
69 Human Rights Council Resolution 32/13, The promotion, protection, and enjoyment of human
rights on the Internet, A/HRC/32/L.20 (27 June 2016), available from

http://ap.ohchr.org/documents/dpage_e.aspx?si=A/HRC/32/L.20.
70 “Telecom Indicators”, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, accessed April 18, 2018,
71Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom, Digital Pakistan Policy 2017 (Islamabad:
MOITT)
33
has been criminalised through laws such as Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act
2016, and overbroad powers have been delegated to the Executive Institutions
to censor information online.

In the midst of these challenges and opportunities, the Ministry of Information
Technology and Telecom (MOITT) in August 2017, has put forth Pakistan’s first
formal IT policy. Officially named the Digital Pakistan Policy 2017, the document
maps out challenges and opportunities for ICT in Pakistan and “strives to
improve its citizens’ quality of life and economic wellbeing by ensuring
availability of accessible, affordable, reliable, universal and high quality ICT
services”. MOITT has reportedly conducted various multi-‐stakeholder
consultations for the Digital Pakistan Policy 2017.72

The policy reflects the government’s vision in terms of various IT related
interventions that it plans to undertake over the course of many years. It also
draws up a clear division of responsibilities and have charted out roles for the
Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Planning and
Development, and the Ministry of Law and Justice to name a few.

Some of the key highlights of the Digital Pakistan Policy 2017 are as follows:

Legislation

This section of the policy charts out the “necessary policy frameworks, laws and
rules to enable creation of a sustainable IT environment”. Among other points,
the policy recognises the importance of data protection and online privacy
protection of the users and pledges to protect it through a ‘data protection law’.
It also talks about developing frameworks for regulating cloud based systems
that includes data classification mechanisms, and making use of digital
signatures to augment data security and authentication.

It pledges to make amendments to rules of businesses of various departments to
facilitate processes of e-‐governance including electronic workflows, e-‐commerce,
online submissions/approvals.

Investment in infrastructure and software

The policy envisages the development of technology parks and incubation
centres in various urban centres across Pakistan to encourage ICT related
innovation. It also touches upon the ideas of encouraging procurement of
software and hardware from local markets.

It pledges to establish innovation centres for ‘fin-‐tech, Internet of things and
artificial intelligence’.

Also, the policy talks about setting up big data centres that would enable data
mining and analysis of the big data. The policy discourages “the establishment of

72 Ibid.
34
silo IT infrastructures (small islands) in different government offices to mitigate
duplication of efforts, HR requirements and operational expenses.”
Interestingly, the government has also expressed interest in exploring the field of
‘Open Source’. It pledges to encourage Research and Development around Open
Source.

IT interventions with the help of various government departments

A number of interventions have been proposed to revamp different sectors:
In agriculture sector, it envisions setting up of “Agriculture Information Portal”
that will host a wide range of information about prices, horticultural diseases
and their treatment, quality of water, weather updates and supply/demand data
from agricultural commodity markets. It also encourages revamping of
geographical information system, preparation of research material in local
languages, building of ICT capacity in local languages,

In health sector, it envisions the utilisation of telemedicine services to reach out
to people in rural areas. It also envisions building an online network of medical
specialists or paramedical staff to work with people directly or online. It also
talks about setting up a central health database interconnecting private and
public hospitals. Lastly, it envisions informing a wider audience about any
epidemic in local languages using ICT tools.

In the education sector, it pledges to take measures to provide network
accessibility in educational institutions in Pakistan, revamp the curriculum to
meet the needs of the industry and bridge the gap between the industry and the
academia and to incorporate courses around coding, cloud computing et al in
curriculum. It also encourages the development of e-‐portals that would allow
students to easily access research and other supplementary materials.
Specifically, the policy pledges to bridge the gender divide in ICT by launching
‘Girls for ICT’ program. This would include establishing computer labs in girls’
schools in under developed areas and courses on computing, coding and
communication in collaboration with private sector.

It also talks about encouraging people to produce and generate content in local
and regional languages in the wake of establishment and operationalisation of
Pakistan registry. It also pledges to support text to speech software creation for
Urdu and regional/local languages to increase the utility of basic mobile phone
based text messages.

In energy sector, it talks about using ICT interventions to manage energy
consumption including introduction of smart metering to control consumption of
electricity, billing, theft, meter and supply line tempering. It also envisions
working with cellular companies to put in place 3G/4G solutions including smart
grids, demand forecasting and availability of consumer portals to control energy
consumption.

In the e-‐commerce, beyond the usual jargon of encouraging small businesses to
come online, there are commitments to promote online banking services and
encouraging others to employ ICT driven tools. The key pledge made by the
35
policy is to “establish a national e-‐commerce gateway with the State Bank of
Pakistan (SBP) with the support and coordination of relevant stakeholders to
promote internet merchant accounts to facilitate B2B and other in-‐bound
transactions.”

Lastly, it also commits to take a series of measures in collaboration with Law and
Justice Ministry to automate the case management within judiciary. It specifically
envisions developing portals for judges so that they are able to access various
kinds of information including calendar, pending tasks and quick links to
research tools. It also pledges to support introduction of Online Dispute
resolution for low level civil matters and thereby promoting Alternative Dispute
resolution.

Policy review

The policy expresses an ambition to invest in infrastructure, building technology
parks, and to work in close collaboration with various ministries towards
automation of many governance services. However, for digital services to be
effective and able to have an impact on people’s lives, a substantially large
population of Pakistan needs to be online and have uninterrupted access to the
Internet and cellular services without disruption.

Only about 30% of Pakistan’s population have access to the Internet, and while
hundreds more are connecting on a daily basis, quality access for all remains a
largely ‘urban’ element. Considering that nearly 62% of country’s population live
in rural or semi urban areas, investment in digital services without a focus on
access will further deepen the digital divide.

The policy does mention ‘access for all’ in the Section VII of the ‘Policy Goals’ and
seeks to “bridge the digital divide including the urban and rural divide, gender
disparity, unserved and underserved areas, inequality for the person with
disabilities, by connecting the unconnected through broadband” but fails to
provide a strategy to achieve this goal in the policy document.

Given the (low) quality of access and its highly urban centric nature, access for
all should have been given the highest priority in Digital Pakistan Policy 2017,
which unfortunately, is not the case.

In addition to the infrastructural issues surrounding quality access for all,
network disruptions and shutdowns in the pretext of ‘security’ are a regular
occurrence in Pakistan. The Internet remains unavailable in most bordering
areas of Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas. Generally, the
areas where people are unconnected because of the lack of infrastructure or
overbroad security measures, are also areas which are most deprived and
underserved. Hence a 'vision’ of ‘connecting the masses’ as described in the
policy without due consideration to issues above is a little too ambitious and
somewhat misleading.

Additionally, there have been various — albeit unconfirmed — reports making
rounds claiming that the government is soliciting proposals and undertaking
36
deals to install deep packet filtering systems and to ban encryption. MOITT and
the federal government of Pakistan has yet to rebut them. Synchronously, the
policy is silent on enabling safe spaces for those who are under threat or are
even attacked for exercising their fundamental rights online. Telegram, a safe
communication tool, remains banned in Pakistan to this point without an official
reason or clarification from MOITT or the federal government and so the claims
of opening up the cyber space for masses are contradicted by such dubious
actions.

On a positive note, it is appreciable that the government has emphasised on the
importance of data protection law and pledged to take steps to protect the
privacy of the people online. However, its important to mention here that
despite many assurances, the MOITT and the federal government has failed to
bring the legislation in the Parliament for discussion before the end of its
parliamentary term in June 2018.

Additionally, the policy expresses a commitment to centralise the otherwise
distributed databases of the federal government such as that of Federal Board of
Revenue (FBR) and National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), to
“enable data mining and analysis” and “enhance the quality of e-‐Government
services through real-‐time integrated management and data analytics”.

While the centralisation of data and services will be a step forward in e-‐
governance, there are serious concerns surrounding the safety of data. There
have been reported cases where the complete database of NADRA was found on
detachable storage drives and recorded by the law enforcement agencies. The
data reportedly was being sold online for as low as 5,000 PKR. The policy does
express commitment to safety and security of data, but it needs to be translated
in action with the same rigour.

A substantial part of the policy focuses on the promotion of digital services,
including e-‐banking. However, it is disappointing to note that the federal
government finds no urgency in addressing the rising number of cyber attacks
targeting the e-‐banking services and other critical information infrastructure
such as NADRA. The component of cyber-‐security also seems to be missing from
the Digital Pakistan Policy 2017.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the policy does not pledge in any way to
promote transparency in the decisions made around the Internet, especially
those related to online content and policy interventions being taken by various
government departments to censor online content. In a section titled
‘Legislation’ in ‘Digital Pakistan Policy Strategy’, the policy charts out a list of
legislation that needs to be enacted or amended to assist in the implementation
of Digital Pakistan Policy 2017.

It, however, does not include the overbroad provisions in Prevention of
Electronic Crimes Act 2016 that stand to endanger and criminalise free
expression online in various forms and the absolute authority given to the
Pakistan Telecommunication Authority — an executive body under the federal
37
government — to censor online content interpreting the language of the
Constitution of Pakistan.

Conclusion
There are no doubts that the Digital Pakistan Policy 2017 seeks to expand the
ICT industry and introduce various new digital services to improve the lives of
citizens, but it fails to take stock of a number of Internet and digital rights issues,
which makes it difficult to make full use of the potential that Internet as a
universal medium has to offer. We feel that a policy that seeks “to become a
strategic enabler for an accelerated digitisation eco system to expand the
knowledge based economy” cannot succeed without a special focus on citizen-‐
friendly and rights-‐friendly policies and strategies.

38

39
Chapter 5
Pakistan’s Cybercrime Act: From implementation to
implications
Talal Raza

Pakistan introduced its first comprehensive cybercrime law called “Pakistan
Electronic Crimes Act (PECA)” in 2016. The law was tabled in National Assembly
in 2015 but remained under discussion in both houses of the parliament. After
extensive deliberations with different stakeholders including members of civil
society, it was finally passed on August 11, 2016 by National Assembly of
Pakistan and formally approved by the President of Pakistan. 73

Background

It was not the first piece of legislation in cyberspace. Earlier in 2002, Pakistan
introduced Electronic Transaction Ordinance that included some punishments
against damage or illegal access to information system. However, the bill was
viewed as less effective as it did not cover widely various offences being
committed in cyberspace.74 To fill the gap, the then President (retd.) General
Pervaiz Musharaf promulgated Pakistan Electronic Crimes Ordinance in 2007
that covered a wide range issues in cyberspace. For the first time, the ordinance
also put in place punishments against offences such as cyber terrorism. Also,
around the same time, a cybercrime unit was also established within Federal
Investigation Agency to lead investigations into cybercrimes. However, the
ordinance could not become an act and lapsed in 2009. Dawn reported that the
bill was vehemently opposed by Anusha Rehman, PML-‐N’s IT Minister since
2013 for ‘meting out harsh punishments for “moral crimes”.’75

During 2009-‐2016, Pakistan was virtually without any cybercrime law.

Salient features of PECA

It was in April 2015 when another draft bill named Pakistan Electronic Crimes
Bill (PECB) emerged. Under the leadership of IT Minister Anusha Rehman, the
bill was put forth as a tool to fight terrorism. An Interior Ministry report called
PECB as “cornerstone of National Action Plan”, an anti-‐terrorism policy that was
adopted by all major stakeholders from the civil and military establishment in
the wake of December 2014 Army Public School Peshawar terrorist attack.76
That is why there are at least four sections that specifically deal with terrorism in
cyberspace. These include Sections 9 on glorification of terrorists/terrorist

73 Parliament of Pakistan, The Gazette of Pakistan (Islamabad: Parliament of Pakistan, 2016)
74 Dr. Nadia Khadim, “Seriousness towards cybercrime laws in Pakistan,” The News, August 19,
2016 , accessed March 20, 2018, https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/143651-‐Seriousness-‐

towards-‐cyber-‐crime-‐laws-‐in-‐Pakistan
75 “Surf Safely: Evolution of the cyberspace laws in Pakistan”, Dawn, May 10, 2016, accessed
March 20, 2018, https://herald.dawn.com/news/1153380

76 Jahanzaib Haque, “Analysis: The dangers of fighting terror with a cybercrime bill,” Dawn,
September 12, 2015, accessed March 20, 2018,

https://www.dawn.com/news/1206465/analysis-‐the-‐dangers-‐of-‐fighting-‐terror-‐with-‐a-‐
cybercrime-‐bill
40
offences, Section 10 on cyber terrorism, Section 11 on hatespeech and Section 12
on planning, recruitment and motivation to fund terror activities. 77

It is important to mention here that apart from anti-‐terror clauses, other issues
are also dealt within PECA. These include punishments for offences such as
online defamation, spamming, cyber stalking, electronic fraud, unauthorized
issuance of SIM cards, unauthorized interception and tempering of
communication equipment. Apart from that, the government is also set to
introduce blasphemy provisions under PECA in the light of orders issued by
Islamabad High Court. The draft amendment has yet to be tabled at the National
Assembly but it has been approved by the cabinet.78

Executive’s mandate

Under PECA, a number of bodies have been given mandate to perform their
respective duties including investigation against criminal offences, blocking of
online content and surveillance. 79

Investigating agency

Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has been given the mandate to investigate
cases related to cybercrimes under PECA. Joint investigation teams along with
other law enforcement agencies can also be formulated under the law. Recently,
it was reported that Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency ISI had requested
Ministry of Interior to deal with cybercrimes undermining National Security. The
Government has readily agreed to this proposal and also requested civilian
intelligence agency Intelligence Bureau (IB) to submit their proposals. 80
Although it is not specified what sort of crimes would be dealt by them, but
cybercrimes related to terrorism are most likely to be dealt by intelligence
community or along with FIA or other law enforcement agencies. It was also
learned through sources that offences related to “cyber terrorism” were
proposed by ISI. In fact, Haroon Baloch, a rights activist at Bytes for All Pakistan
and aware of the consultation shared with the scribe that when the rights
activists tried to probe FIA to talk about it.

FIA representative refused to discuss it as they said that the provisions had been
proposed by ISI and that only they could discuss. Till the writing of this piece, it
is not yet clear what authorities will intelligence agencies enjoy under PECA to
deal with “cybercrimes that are undermining National Security” as the rules
have yet to be formulated.

Additionally, FIA has also been authorized to seize data for criminal investigation
after seeking a warrant from Court designated under this act. However, in cases

77 Parliament of Pakistan
78 Ibid.
79 Ibid.
80 Zahid Gishkori, “ISI to take Action against Cybercrimes Breaching National Security,” Geo News,
October 20, 2016, accessed December 15, 2016, https://www.geo.tv/latest/118292-‐Govt-‐

accepts-‐ISIs-‐role-‐in-‐taking-‐action-‐against-‐cyber-‐crimes.
41
(especially cyber terrorism) where the investigation officer is of the opinion that
the data needed for criminal investigation may be lost or destroyed if not
immediately seized, it could retain the designated data and then seek warrants
from the Court within 24 hours of the data retention.81

Warrant for accessing content

Also, section 34 states that if an authorized officer is able to prove to the court
that the content in a particular information system is needed to be accessed for
criminal investigation, the court may order the person/service provider in
charge of the information system to provide the officer with access to data. The
validity of the warrant would be seven days and court needs to be reached out
for further extension.82

Real time information collection

Furthermore, PECA also mandates real time content collection or surveillance for
investigating cybercrimes. Section 39 of the law permits surveillance under “real
time collection and recording of information” after seeking permission of the
Court designated under this act. The court after receiving the request, would
order the designated agency under FTA 2013 or others having the capability to
carry out the information collection in collaboration with investigating agency if
it is satisfied that the data is with the person/place nominated and that the data
required is essential for criminal investigation. However, the permission for real
time data collection would not extend beyond seven days and that Court would
need to be requested again if the extension of real time data collection is
required.83

Blocking of content

Under section 37 of PECA, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has
been mandated to block any content or orders to remove it if it is against the
“glory of Islam, security or defence of Pakistan, public order, decency or morality
or in relation to contempt of court or commission or incitement of an offence”
under this Act.84

Service providers

Service providers are bound to retain the traffic data for at least a year or as
specified by PTA. They are also supposed to assist investigation agency in
retrieving the data as per their request under court warrants. No criminal
liability will be on service providers as long as they are assisting the executive
under the PECA rules.85

81 Parliament of Pakistan.
82 Ibid.
83 Ibid.
84 Ibid
85 Ibid
42
Protection against misuse of executive authority

Apart from Court appeal against PTA on issues of content blocking, there are
protections against misuse of personal data and content at the hands of service
providers or officers of investigation agency. Section 41 of the law says86:
“Notwithstanding immunity granted under any other law for the time being in
force, any person including a service provider while providing services under the
terms of the lawful contract or otherwise in accordance with the law or an
authorized officer who has secured access to any material or data containing
personal information about another person discloses such material to any other
person, except when required by law, without the consent of the person
concerned or in breach of lawful contract with the intent to cause or knowing
that is he is likely to cause harm, wrongful loss or gain to any person or
compromise confidentiality of such material or data shall be punished with
imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years or more or with fine
which may extend to one million rupees or with both:

Provided that the burden of proof of any defense taken by an accused service
provider or an authorized officer that he was acting in good faith, shall be on
such a service provider or the authorized officer, as the case may be.”

Computer Emergency Response teams:

Furthermore, the Federal government will also set up “Computer Emergency
Response teams” comprising of technical experts from intelligence or any other
agency for the protection of critical infrastructure87.
It is also not clear when will the Computer Emergency Response teams be
created. Till the writing of the report, nothing has been known about the
establishment of Computer Emergency Response team.

Courts:

Under the PECA, the Federal Government in consultation with the Chief Justice of
Pakistan will designate presiding officers to deal with cybercrime cases. The
Federal government has been tasked to make arrangements to train presiding
officers in computer sciences, cyber forensics, electronic transactions and data
protections. It took more than seven months before 31 Additional Session
Judges (ADJ) and Judicial Magistrates (JD) across Pakistan were designated by
Law Ministry to deal with cybercrime cases. This included 27 ADJs and JDs in
Sindh, one ADJ and a JD each in Islamabad Lahore, Rawalpindi, Peshawar and
Quetta. Under PECA, the courts were designated after consultation with Chief
Justices of Lahore, Peshawar, Karachi and Islamabad High Court respectively.

However, why the government decided to designate an additional session judge
and a magistrate to hear cybercrime cases in each district of Sindh, whereas the
most populous province Punjab only had courts designated in Lahore and
Rawalpindi to hear cybercrime cases remains a mystery. “The number of

86 Ibid
87 Ibid.
43
presiding officers on PECA was decided in the light of suggestions from Chief
Justices of their respective High Courts,” connived a senior official at Ministry of
Information Technology adding that Ministry had no role in finalizing the
number of judges.88

Collaboration with international partners

Under PECA, Pakistan government can extend its cooperation to any foreign
government or international agency whether it is investigating a cybercrime or
collecting information under PECA. It can also pass on the information to them
when deemed appropriate.

PECA implementation and Human Rights concerns

Although, there are no internationally agreed upon principles that could guide
the behaviors of states in the context of human rights while dealing with
cybercrimes, normative debates within this area has begun by multiple
stakeholders including civil society and corporations. A number of groups such
as APC, GNI and 13 International Principles on application of Human Rights on
Communications Surveillance (signed by more than 400 organizations) to the
name few are important. Inspired from these normative debates, Pakistani civil
society also tried to analyze the law and put forth their following concerns89:

● The law has been put in place from the security mindset rather than from
the rights perspective. There should have been no space for anti-‐terror
provisions that are pre dominantly dealing with information in the
cybercrime law.90

● The language of the law is overbroad and can be used to punish political
dissent.91 As evidence, the registration of cases against political activists
under section 20 of PECA is interesting. A number of political activists
were nabbed by FIA for being critical of the military. Interestingly, Section
20 furnishes punishments against anyone damaging the dignity of the
person. Civil society challenged this move in Sindh High Court, arguing
that the cybercrime act did not furnish punishments if anything was said
against the dignity of armed forces and that the law was being misapplied.
The case is still in Sindh High Court and points towards the substantial
evidence and fears expressed earlier by rights activists. There are many
provisions such as those dealing with hate-‐speech and cyber terrorism
that can also be potentially used to silence political dissent.92

88 Talal Raza, “Pakistan’s Cyber Law: A Year in Review,” Digital Rights Monitor, October 17, 2017,
accessed March 20, 2018, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/pakistans-‐cyber-‐law-‐a-‐year-‐in-‐review .

89 Talal Raza, The Dilemma of dealing with Terrorism in Cyberspace and Peoples’ Digital Rights: A
Case Study of Pakistan (MPhil diss., National Defence University, 2017), 52-‐59
90 Ibid.
91 Ibid.
92 Aleena Alavi, lawyer, personal communication.
44
● In regards to blocking, PECA is silent on whether PTA should publicly
share the list of online websites/social media pages it can block. The idea
of making the list public is to allow activists to see whether the
justification given by PTA to block certain content was actually
reasonable or it ended up blocking unrelated content. The context of this
suggestion is that PTA in the past ended up blocking non-‐pornographic
content for being pornographic. Additionally, rights activists suggested
that PTA should not be given powers to block online content as it was a
government body. Blocking the online content should have been the
jurisdiction of an independent judicial body.93

● Also, PECA binds FIA to submit half a yearly report around PECA
implementation. When the act came into force, rights activists suggested
that this mechanism could have been strengthened to check human rights
violations but it was least likely that parliamentarians would take up such
measures. Fast forward to March 2018, since the past 19 months, FIA was
only able to submit only one report that too after a lapse of 17 months in
January 2018. The details of the report are not public yet and there is no
publicly available information that could suggest that parliamentarians
took up the matter of human rights violations under PECA. However,
according to parts of the report available with Digital Rights Monitor, FIA
requested the government to make cognizable some offences owing to
their critical nature. These include access, modification, interference,
deletion to critical infrastructure (Sections 6,7 & 8), electronic forgery
(section 13), electronic fraud (Section 14), unauthorized issuance of SIM
cards (Section 17), tampering of electronic equipment (Section 18),
cyberstalking (Section 24) and spoofing (Section 26). 94

● Also, in the midst of rising cybercrimes where courts are faced with
challenges of dealing with cybercrimes, government should have
expedited the process of training presiding officers. Without
understanding cybercrime, there is a chance that justice might not be
dispensed. 95

● Another concern is about real time collection of information. It allows
officers to collect real time information through courts’ orders for seven
days. However, it doesn’t put bar on the number of times the warrant
could be reissued. This law also doesn’t specify what type of technology
could be used to carry out surveillance.96

93 Talal Raza, The Dilemma.
94 Talal Raza, “FIA submits ‘half-‐yearly’ report on electronic crimes after a one year delay; asks
for 7 offences to be declared ‘non-‐bailable’ and a ban on ‘Bitcoin’”, Digital Rights Monitor, January
18, 2018, accessed March 20, 2018, http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/fia-‐submits-‐half-‐yearly-‐
report-‐on-‐electronic-‐crimes-‐after-‐a-‐one-‐year-‐delay-‐asks-‐for-‐7-‐offences-‐to-‐be-‐declared-‐non-‐
bailable-‐and-‐a-‐ban-‐on-‐bitcoin.
95 Talal Raza, The Dilemma
96 Ibid.
45
Recommendations

Initially, when the human rights activists put forth these concerns, they were
brushed aside by the government. IT Minister Anusha Rehman even accused
civil society of weakening the law. However, as the months passed by, ironically,
the same law was used to arrest political workers, some of them apparently
affiliated with the ruling party. 97Even members of other political parties were
arrested for expressing their views online against the military. However, there
has not been much interest shown publicly by political parties in taking
measures to reform PECA. Former Senator Farhatullah Babar noted that one
way for civil society to influence the law was to engage with government on
formulation of the rules under PECA. However, rules have yet to be finalized.

Surprisingly, government officials at MOITT, the ministry leading the rules
formation process, were not clear when the rules would be finalized. The overall
lack of transparency in the rules only give credence to the concerns of the civil
society that backdoors were deliberately left within the law to twist the arms of
political opponents, journalists and other free speech activists.

Moving forward, the following actions are needed from the government and
other stakeholders.

i. The government should prepare the rules devised under PECA at the earliest so
that specifics are made clear on how the executive would operate under PECA.

ii The government should also find ways to make the process of online content
blocking more transparent.

iii. The government should ensure that presiding officers listening to court cases
are given training around cybercrimes and build their capacity to prevent
misapplication of law.

iv.. Civil society actors also need to come together and run organized, targeted
advocacy and lobbying campaigns aimed at different stakeholders including
journalists, parliamentarians and academia to help them understand the
implications of the law. Unless, the issue begins resonating with them, it will be
hard to push for a change and convince government lawmakers to make amends
to the law.

97 Talal Raza, “PECA exposed as the ruling Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz falls victim to the law,”
Digital Rights Monitor, October 18, 2017, accessed March 18,

http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/peca-‐exposed-‐as-‐the-‐ruling-‐party-‐pakistan-‐muslim-‐league-‐
nawaz-‐falls-‐victim-‐to-‐the-‐law/
46
47

48
Chapter 6
E-‐Governance in Pakistan: Hopeful Signs for the Future
Waqas Naeem

E-‐governance initiatives in Pakistan have received positive attention from the
federal and provincial governments in the recent past, but the upward trajectory of
these initiatives is undercut by territorial isolation of projects, the sluggish pace of
federal policymaking, and a digital divide that persists despite a rapid rise in access
to technology. The country needs to consolidate its e-‐governance efforts at the
national level to keep up with the relative pace of progress in e-‐governance in the
region and the larger developing world.

Introduction

E-‐governance involves the use of information and communication technologies
(ICT) by governments to provide information and deliver services to the public.98
The Pakistani federal government first began thinking about e-‐governance at the
dawn of the 21st Century when it engaged in a push for better ICT
infrastructure. 99 Recent domestic political activity around slogans of
transparency and accountability has led to a renewed surge in e-‐governance
projects.100 101

The fresh interest in e-‐governance is also encouraged by Pakistan’s international
commitments, such as the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) and the Open Government Partnership, and the country’s burgeoning
technology landscape.

The number of Internet users in Pakistan has increased during the past five
years. Pakistan had 42.1 million 3G/4G Internet subscribers in 2016-‐17
compared to 1.4 million in 2013-‐14, when these services were first
introduced.102 During the same period, broadband Internet subscribers in the
country rose to 44.6 million from 5.2 million.103

98 “UN Global E-‐Government Readiness Report 2005: From E-‐government to E-‐inclusion,” United
Nations, accessed March 21, 2018.

https://publicadministration.un.org/egovkb/Portals/egovkb/Documents/un/2005-‐
Survey/Complete-‐survey.pdf
99 “Pakistan IT Policy and Action Plan,” United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for
Information and Communication Technology for Development, accessed March 21, 2018.
http://www.unapcict.org/ecohub/resources/pakistan-‐information-‐technology-‐policy
100 “KP Govt introduces E-‐governance for Transparency, Accountability: Mushtaq,” Pakistan
Today online, accessed March 21, 2018. https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2015/09/30/kp-‐

govt-‐introduces-‐e-‐governance-‐for-‐transparency-‐accountability-‐mushtaq/
101 Imaduddin, “E-‐government to achieve Transparency, Accountability in Service Delivery”.
Business Recorder online, last modified June 18, 2013.

https://www.brecorder.com/2013/06/18/124257/
102 “Annual Report 2017,” Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, accessed March 21, 2018.
https://www.pta.gov.pk/assets/media/ann_rep_2017.pdf
103 ibid.
49
The country’s internet penetration numbers are still below global and Asian
averages.104 However, when these statistics are coupled with the fact that 7 in 10
Pakistanis own a cellphone, the potential for e-‐governance becomes clear.105
Pakistan’s federal and provincial governments can use technology to connect
with the masses, at least in the urban centres where access is more prevalent.106

Additionally, the global discourse on e-‐governance considers efficient
government processes, better service delivery, and increased public
participation through access to information as fundamental characteristics of e-‐
governments.107 It is essentially an ICT-‐route to good governance.108 Perhaps
Pakistani political parties have realised e-‐governance could be the way to win
back the trust of a public which is all too familiar with corruption, incompetence,
and inefficiency in government operations.109

Policy and Regulatory Background

The earliest hint at e-‐governance in Pakistan appears in the federal
government’s Information Technology (IT) Policy and Action Plan, launched in
the year 2000. While the policy did not explicitly use the term e-‐governance, it
did mention the use of information technology in the functioning of the
government.110 It also suggested setting up IT boards in each province, and
advised that national databases of economic activities should be made accessible
to the public online to encourage transparency. However, its main focus was on
IT infrastructure. Subsequently, an Electronic Government Directorate was
established in 2002. It worked on a number of automation and e-‐service projects

104 Umer Ali, and Harris bin Munawwar, “Internet Landscape of Pakistan 2017,” Bytes for All,
Pakistan, accessed March 21, 2018. https://content.bytesforall.pk/publication/internet-‐

landscape-‐pakistan-‐2017
105 “Telecomm Indicators,” Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, accessed March 21, 2018.
106 “Offline and falling behind: Barriers to Internet adoption,” McKInsey & Company, accessed
March 21, 2018.

https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Industries/High%20Tech/Our%20Insights/Of
fline%20and%20falling%20behind%20Barriers%20to%20Internet%20adoption/Offline_and_fa
lling_behind_barriers_to_internet_adoption_full%20report_FINAL.ashx
107 “UN Global E-‐Government Readiness Report 2005: From E-‐government to E-‐inclusion,” United
Nations, accessed March 21, 2018.

https://publicadministration.un.org/egovkb/Portals/egovkb/Documents/un/2005-‐
Survey/Complete-‐survey.pdf
108 Richard Heeks. Understanding e-‐governance for development. (Manchester: Institute for
Development Policy and Management, 2001),

https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/31803060/e_governance_for_developmen
t.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A&Expires=1521622971&Signature=7wJ24cR
IsQV701ufZuSG2O5jdbc%3D&response-‐content-‐
disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3De_governance_for_development.pdf
109 Anwar Iqbal, “Pakistanis’ trust in civilian govt has nosedived: US survey,” Dawn online, last
modified February 14, 2013. https://www.dawn.com/news/786132

110 “Pakistan IT Policy and Action Plan,” United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for
Information and Communication Technology for Development, accessed March 21, 2018.
http://www.unapcict.org/ecohub/resources/pakistan-‐information-‐technology-‐policy
50
before it was merged with the Pakistan Computer Bureau to form the National IT
Board in 2014.111

Pakistan does not have an active e-‐governance policy at the federal level at the
moment, but the draft Digital Pakistan Policy 2017 comes closest to providing a
foundation for e-‐governance efforts.112

The draft, finalised in August 2017 and pending approval from the Economic Co-‐
ordination Committee, lists the promotion of e-‐governance as its 12 policy goals.
It suggests integrated government databases and applications could help ensure
efficiency, transparency and accountability.113

The draft policy also mentions the need for better service delivery, digital
security for government departments, human resources in IT, and e-‐government
service portals for information dissemination within government and to citizens.
A cross-‐cutting goal, for which action plans will supposedly be prepared later, is
the digitisation of sectors such as agriculture, health, and commerce. These e-‐
governance aspects of the policy are in line with some targets listed under the
SDG 16, which is discussed in more detail later in this chapter.

Other than the draft policy and broader regulations for telecommunication and
Internet use, there is no separate set of regulations for ICT in the country
apparently.114

The 18th Constitutional Amendment allowed provinces autonomy in a number of
areas. While communications remained a federal subject, there was no apparent
limitation on provinces to pursue information technology (IT) issues. Perhaps
that’s why provincial digital policies operate largely independently of the federal
IT ministry. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, for example, has outlined a
“broader view” of e-‐governance, which is not limited to digitisation of public
records but will allow citizens to access government services.115

Punjab set up its IT board as early as 1999, Sindh in 2002, and Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa in 2011.116,117,118 Balochistan has an IT department that is focused
on e-‐governance.119

111 “Introduction,” National Information Technology Board, accessed March 21, 2018.
http://www.nitb.gov.pk/index.php/features/overview
112 “Digital Pakistan Policy 2017,” Federal Ministry of Information Technology and
Telecommunication, accessed March 21, 2018. http://moit.gov.pk/policies/dgp08aug.pdf

113 Amin Yusufzai, “Digital Pakistan Policy 2017 at a Glance.” ProPakistani online, last modified
August 15, 2018. https://propakistani.pk/2017/08/15/digital-‐pakistan-‐policy-‐2017-‐glance/

114 “Pakistan lack laws on ICT,” The Express Tribune, last modified December 19, 2014.
https://tribune.com.pk/story/809176/pakistan-‐lack-‐laws-‐on-‐ict/
115 “E-‐governance,” Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, accessed March 21, 2018.
http://kp.gov.pk/page/e_governance
116 “About Us,” Punjab Information Technology Board, accessed March 21, 2018.
https://www.pitb.gov.pk/about
117 “Karachi: Sindh IT board constituted,” DAWN, last modified November 22, 2002.
118 “About KPITB,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Technology Board, accessed March 21,
2018. http://www.kpitb.gov.pk/about
51
The Punjab IT Board (PITB) and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa IT Board (KPITB) –
more active than their national counterparts – are leading the e-‐governance
initiatives in the country.

The Current State of E-‐Governance in Pakistan

The pre-‐dominant forms of e-‐governance interventions launched by the PITB,
the KPITB, and federal ministries, including the IT ministry, can be termed as
government-‐to-‐government (G2G) and government-‐to-‐citizen (G2C) services in
global e-‐governance parlance.

The IT ministry’s key focus areas have been digitisation of records and the
development an e-‐office suite that can be deployed in all federal government
institutions to move away from the traditional offline filing system. 120 The
ministry has held intra-‐governmental events to promote the e-‐suite and also
conducted trainings.121 122

The NITB, which works under the IT ministry, led the development of this e-‐
office suite.123 Its other e-‐governance projects include an online recruitment
system for the federal public service commission and an online complaint cell for
the ministry of water and power. At the federal level, the National Database &
Registration Authority (NADRA) serves as a good example of an e-‐governance
solution provider. NADRA has used its digitised citizen identification and
registration system to develop smart ID cards, disburse aid for social security
programs (such as the Benazir Income Support Program), and digitise civil
registration (such as birth and death certificates).124

The KPITB’s strategic goal is to “accelerate digitization in all sectors and position
the province as a global technology hub” while its vision includes “better services
and improved governance through ICTs.125” The KPITB has reached out to the
tech industry in six districts through its Durshal project, which includes a
government innovation lab (GIL) where innovators, software programmers, and

119 “Home,” Balochistan Science and Information Technology department, accessed March 21,
2018.
http://www.balochistan.gov.pk/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&i
d=34&Itemid=732
120 “E-‐governance Established to Promote Digital Culture in Pakistan,” ProPakistani, last modified
September 7, 2015: https://propakistani.pk/2015/09/07/e-‐governance-‐established-‐to-‐

promote-‐digital-‐culture-‐in-‐pakistan/
121 APP, “E-‐governance for good governance,” Pakistan Today online, last modified May 14, 2014.
https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2014/05/14/e-‐governance-‐for-‐good-‐governance-‐2/
122 “13 ministries to have e-‐filing system soon,” The News International online, last modified
September 5, 2015. https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/14458-‐13-‐ministries-‐to-‐have-‐e-‐filing-‐

system-‐soon
123 “Introduction to e-‐Office Suite,” National Information Technology Board, accessed on March
22, 2018. http://www.nitb.gov.pk/index.php/public-‐notices/active-‐projects/ongoing-‐

projects/e-‐office
124 “e-‐Governance,” National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), accessed on March
22, 2018. https://www.nadra.gov.pk/solutions/e-‐governance/

125 “About Us,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Technology Board, accessed March 22, 2018.
http://www.kpitb.gov.pk/about
52
entrepreneurs can propose e-‐governance solutions for local government
departments.126 The GIL is linked with a six-‐month fellowship and amongst its
recent achievements is a smartphone developed for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Traffic Police.127 The app allows citizens to receive live traffic updates, verify
their licenses, register complaints against police, among other things and works
in both G2C and Citizen-‐to-‐Government (C2G) modes.128

Between 2013 and 2018, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has also worked
on up gradation of government websites, enacted a right to information law that
includes online proactive disclosure of government records, launched an online
grievance redress system for citizens, developed an e-‐recruitment portal, and
introduced a phone-‐and-‐online system for registering police complaints.129 130 131
132 133

The PITB has operated for a longer duration than the KPITB and boasts of a vast
portfolio of e-‐government schemes. 134 It currently employs over 1,000
professionals and has built a state-‐of-‐the-‐art 17-‐storey building for its offices in
Lahore called the Arfa Software Technology Park, which also houses a tech
incubator, a startup accelerator, a co-‐working space, and an IT university. The
PITB’s five-‐year performance review, the “Digital Punjab: Enhancing Public
Services Through Technology 2012-‐2017” report, provides case studies of over
80 projects altogether in sectors such as health, law and order, education, and
agriculture as well as in services related to citizens and the general automation
of government functions.135

In the health sector, the PITB developed a G2G smartphone application for the
Extended Programme on Immunisation (EPI), which administers vaccinations to
children for nine diseases, including polio, measles, and Hepatitis-‐B. The PITB
claims the application allowed EPI to monitor attendance and performance of

126 “Durshal | Project Description,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Technology Board,
accessed March 22, 2018. http://www.kpitb.gov.pk/projects/durshal
127 “Durshal GIL,” Durshal, accessed March 22, 2018. http://www.durshal.com/gil
128 Ebtihaj, “A step towards digital KPK,” Code for Pakistan, last modified July 2, 2017.
http://codeforpakistan.org/blog/2017/07/02/a-‐step-‐towards-‐digital-‐kpk/
129 “Right to Information: K-‐P becomes first province to enact updated RTI,” The Express Tribune
online, last modified December 7, 2013. https://tribune.com.pk/story/642174/right-‐to-‐

information-‐k-‐p-‐becomes-‐first-‐province-‐to-‐enact-‐updated-‐rti/
130 “Home,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Online Complaint & Redressal Cell, accessed
March 22, 2018. http://crckp.gov.pk/

131 “E-‐recruitment Initiative,” Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, accessed March 22, 2018.
http://apply.kp.gov.pk/
132 “Increased accessibility: Police launches automated complaint redressal system,” The Express
Tribune, last modified November 12, 2014.

133 “Online FIR,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police, accessed March 22, 2018.
http://kppolice.gov.pk/online/fir.php
134 “Home,” Punjab Information Technology Board, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.pitb.gov.pk/
135 “Digital Punjab: Enhancing Public Services Through Technology 2012-‐2017,” Punjab
Information Technology Board, accessed March 22, 2018.

http://learn.punjab.gov.pk/publishbooklet/files/downloads/Digital%20Punjab.pdf
53
vaccinators in three provinces and helped vaccinators send immunisation data in
real-‐time to a central database, with marked improvements.136

While the immunisation app is for internal use, a similar monitoring of education
performance has been linked with a public-‐facing data portal. The PITB worked
with the Punjab education department to give school monitoring officers tablet
PCs to log performance data including statistics on enrolment, attendance and
basic facilities. Previously paper forms were used. The database now has
information from over 1.3 million monitoring visits and can be viewed on a
dedicated website.137 In its report, the PITB claims the system has resulted in 4%
improvements in teacher and student presence as well as efficient provision of
support to schools that fall below target performance.

Among the purely G2C e-‐governance services launched by the PITB, the e-‐
Khidmat Markaz (or e-‐Service Centre) facility is now operational in seven
districts. These centres “offer 17 different services” such as traffic fine collection
and issuance of route permits.138 The PITB claims these centres have served
over 0.7 million citizens and processed 0.35 million applications.

In addition to these efforts, all four provinces are in the process of digitising their
land records and setting geographical information systems for their land
records.

Some of these e-‐governance initiatives fulfill at least at a sub-‐national level the
sixth target of UN’s SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions), which most
directly supports e-‐governments.139 Target 6 calls on member governments to
“develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels.140” The
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s online police complaints system – Punjab has also
deployed a similar system – attempts to bring transparency, for example, to the
police department. The UN also recognises police as one of the two institutions
most affected by corruption worldwide.141 Similarly, some of the Punjab and
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa e-‐governance projects, such as the service centres and
grievance redress system respectively, might promote effective governance and
accountability.

Two other targets of SDG 16 also link with e-‐governance. These are target 7,
which seeks to “ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative

136 ibid.
137 “Home,” Programme Monitoring & Implementation Unit, Government of Punjab, accessed
March 22, 2018. http://open.punjab.gov.pk/schools/home/landing
138 “Digital Punjab: Enhancing Public Services Through Technology 2012-‐2017,” Punjab
Information Technology Board, accessed March 22, 2018.

http://learn.punjab.gov.pk/publishbooklet/files/downloads/Digital%20Punjab.pdf
139 “Goal 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions,” United Nations Development Programme,
accessed March 22, 2018. https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/sustainable-‐

development-‐goals/goal-‐16-‐peace-‐justice-‐and-‐strong-‐institutions/
140 “Goal 16 Targets,” United Nations Development Programme, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/sustainable-‐development-‐goals/goal-‐16-‐peace-‐
justice-‐and-‐strong-‐institutions/targets/
141 ibid.
54
decision-‐making at all levels”, and target 10, which asks governments to “ensure
public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance
with national legislation and international agreements”. 142 Target 10 is
especially important since it leads to open data and online public participation,
which are key components of e-‐government development indicators.143

While most of the e-‐governance schemes introduced in the Pakistan seem to
contribute little to increase participatory decision-‐making, Pakistan has a strong
presence of access to information legislations.

In 2010, the country’s constitution gave citizens the right of access to
information through its Article 19-‐A.144 On paper, Pakistan’s four provinces and
the federal area currently have right to information (RTI) laws. The Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab, Sindh and federal governments enacted new access to
information laws between 2013 and 2018. However, the implementation of
these laws is flawed. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s government tried to introduce
amendments to weaken sections in the law that empowered citizens in February
2018. 145 The Punjab government has not appointed new information
commissioners, thereby making the appellate body set up under the law
dysfunctional.146 Sindh and the federal area have not even established appellate
bodies mandated by their respective laws.147

Perhaps due to the slow and demanding nature of the RTI application process,
the general public has not taken to the laws significantly, and mostly only civil
servants, human rights activists and journalists have use the laws regularly.148

The gap between a law (or policy) and its implementation is emblematic of
Pakistan’s governance problems. Often it is because governments pass
legislation or policies without adequate stakeholder consultations or
appropriate attention towards execution and then ignore unresolved concerns
because circumstances force their focus to shift to other policy issues.149

142 ibid.
143 “United Nations E-‐government 2016 Survey: E-‐government in Support of Sustainable
Development,” United Nations Public Administration Network, accessed March 22, 2018.
http://workspace.unpan.org/sites/Internet/Documents/UNPAN97453.pdf
144 “Article: 19A Right to Information,” Pakistan Constitutional Law, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://pakistanconstitutionlaw.com/article-‐19a-‐right-‐to-‐information/
145 Waqas Naeem, “KP Government’s Proposed Amendments would weaken RTI Law” Media for
Transparency, last modified February 27, 2018. http://pakrtidata.org/2018/02/27/right-‐

information-‐kp-‐government-‐amendments-‐bill/
146 Waqas Naeem, “Punjab RTI Law: Lack of Information Commission cripples Enforcement
Mechanism,” Media for Transparency, last modified January 21, 2018.

http://pakrtidata.org/2018/01/21/punjab-‐information-‐commission/
147 Waqas Naeem, “Decision to form Sindh Information Commission rests with CM,” Media for
Transparency, last modified February 9, 2018. http://pakrtidata.org/2018/02/09/decision-‐

sindh-‐information-‐commission-‐cm/
148 “Country Briefing Paper: Right to Information Legislation in Pakistan,” Centre for Peace and
Development Initiatives (2016), accessed March 22, 2018. http://www.cpdi-‐pakistan.org/wp-‐

content/uploads/2017/09/country-‐briefing-‐paper-‐right-‐to-‐information-‐legislation-‐in-‐
pakistan.pdf
149 Ishrat Hussain, “Formulating Public Policy,” Dawn online, last modified November 14, 2013.
55

The shaky status of RTI implementation is a reminder that strong policies can
come to naught if they are not executed well. Poor implementation could pose a
challenge to Pakistan’s e-‐governance ambitions, too. The country’s participation
in the Open Government Partnership has been marred by a similar lack of timely
response.

In 2016, Pakistan joined the Open Government Partnership (OGP), a multilateral
initiative that secures commitments from governments to support transparency
and use of technology for better governance.150 However, Pakistan has blown
two deadlines to submit a national action plan forcing the OGP administration to
send two letters to the Pakistani government reminding it of its responsibility.151
152

In an OGP national action plan, a government usually lists its commitments
towards opening government processes to the citizens and the actual steps it
would take to realise those commitments. For example, the Canadian
government has committed to enhance access to information and increase
transparency in budget processes, among other promises. 153 These
commitments are then independently evaluated by the OGP.
Pakistan’s performance at the OGP is no different from its domestic federal
digital policy, mentioned earlier in this chapter, the pending approval of which
has also delayed the formulation of any action plans relevant to the policy.

Another crucial challenge to e-‐governance in Pakistan is presented by domestic
political rivalries that often lead to superficial and temporary support for
important issues.

When the Pakistan Tehreek-‐e Insaf (PTI)-‐led Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government
passed its RTI law in 2013, the Pakistan Muslim League-‐Nawaz (PML-‐N) quickly
enacted a similar law in Punjab to match it.154 Now the Punjab government
seems to have lost interest in RTI and has not bothered to appoint new
information commissioners to ensure effective implementation of its law.

Political competition is common in Pakistan since the federal and provincial
governments are led by three different political parties (PML-‐N in the centre and
Punjab; Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in Sindh; and PTI in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa)

150 “Pakistan,” Open Government Partnership, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.opengovpartnership.org/countries/pakistan
151 “OGP_Letter_Pakistan_November2017,” Open Government Partnership, accessed March 22,
2018.
https://www.opengovpartnership.org/sites/default/files/OGP_Letter_Pakistan_November2017.
pdf
152 “Pakistan_Cohort Shift Letter_Jan2018,” Open Government Partnership, accessed March 22,
2018.
https://www.opengovpartnership.org/sites/default/files/Pakistan_Cohort%20Shift%20Letter_J
an2018.pdf
153 “Canada,” Open Government Partnership, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.opengovpartnership.org/countries/canada
154 Muhammad Anwar, “Broken Promises on RTI,” The Express Tribune online, last modified
February 11, 2016. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1045145/broken-‐promises-‐on-‐rti/
56
and a political alliance (Balochistan). The competition has some positive
consequences, such as the passage of RTI laws or attention towards e-‐
governance initiatives. But the mutually antagonistic politics by the three major
parties – PML-‐N, PPP and PTI – also limits their ability to collaborate and co-‐
operate at the national level. Even when there is technological co-‐operation, the
political leadership wastes no time in political point-‐scoring.155

As a result, most of the e-‐governance projects remain territorially isolated in one
or the other province. The ones that have been deployed nationwide were
developed by the PITB, which enjoys patronage from the ruling PML-‐N in the
federal government. On the other hand, Pakistan’s e-‐governance commitments,
such as the SDG targets and OGP, not sub-‐national issues but national concerns.
It is unsurprising, then, that Pakistan ranked 159 out of 193 countries in a 2016
UN survey on e-‐governments.156

The survey calculates its E-‐government Development Index (EGDI) – a composite
of telecom infrastructure, human capital, and a survey-‐based online service
index (OSI) – at the national level. The OSI is calculated through surveys of
technological features of national websites and e-‐government policies and
strategies applied for service delivery. If the federal performance lags behind
provincial achievements as is the case in Pakistan, then it is going to reflect
poorly on the international standing.

Pakistan’s position in the ranking has also worsened over the past few years.157
The EGDI is a relative indicator, so the drop in Pakistan’s ranking does not
necessarily mean Pakistan’s e-‐government development has deteriorated. In fact,
it means other countries have improved their e-‐government development at a
quicker pace than Pakistan.

It is likely that Pakistan’s EGDI will improve when its recent increase in Internet
penetration is reflected in the rankings in the future, but the challenge of
national-‐level consolidation of e-‐governance remains.

A final challenge Pakistan needs to reckon with is its persistent digital divide.
While there is no doubt that ICTs have proliferated rapidly, three quarters of the
population still do not have access to Internet. But the divide is not simply one of
e-‐haves and e-‐have-‐nots based on class. The social divisions of gender, religion,
and ethnicity amplify the digital divide. In towns and villages where women are
not allowed to vote in general elections, they might also not be allowed to use
technology.

155 “Rana Sanaullah criticises KP Police for Delayed Arrest in Asma Murder Case,” Dunya News
online, last modified February 7, 2018. https://dunyanews.tv/en/Pakistan/426796-‐Rana-‐

Sanaullah-‐criticises-‐KP-‐Police-‐for-‐delayed-‐arrest-‐in-‐Asma-‐murder-‐ca
156 “United Nations E-‐government 2016 Survey: E-‐government in Support of Sustainable
Development,” United Nations Public Administration Network, accessed March 22, 2018.
http://workspace.unpan.org/sites/Internet/Documents/UNPAN97453.pdf
157 Hasaan Khawar, “Moving beyond e-‐governance,” The Express Tribune online, last modified
April 14, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1383031/moving-‐beyond-‐e-‐governance/
57
The digital divide might not seem like an insurmountable task but it would take a
lot of time, money, and resources to connect more towns and villages in the
country’s rural areas to the Internet and also to bring down the cost of Internet
use. Demand for data services has already pushed cellular service providers to
lower costs or offer subsidised packages.158 Efforts such as the collaboration
between Telenor and Facebook to provide free access to the social network
could also help increase Internet penetration.159

Reflections

The development trajectory of e-‐governance in Pakistan over the past five years
shows a healthy upward trend. The institutional foundations provided by the
PITB and KPITB are likely to support more local government projects and inspire
better strategies and solutions. At the same time, the major hindrances to e-‐
government will come from traditional government’s inefficient practices,
entrenched political divides, and, to a certain extent, social exclusion.

A more comprehensive e-‐government rollout will be gradual but inevitable.
Pakistan’s middle class is growing.160 The country’s economy is also increasingly
becoming reliant on the services sector.161 These two factors will inevitably
increase the demand for e-‐solutions to civic problems because the growth of the
services sector is driven by private consumption and most consumption now
takes place online. The middle-‐income, young, urban citizens will take easily to
technological innovations and are more likely to appreciate a slimmer, more
efficient form of government such as an e-‐government.

E-‐governance initiatives will have to prove their utility to this demographic
before these can be expanded nationwide. Fortunately existing e-‐governance
projects have largely focused on bigger districts and cities. These projects have
also mainly dealt with the most basic public sectors, such as health and
education. Better service delivery in these areas would be welcomed because the
privatisation of health and education has created severe economic pressures on
the Pakistani urban middle class.

Recommendations

Pakistan needs to adopt an e-‐governance policy at the federal level and develop
an action plan urgently. The federal IT ministry should also take the lead in
integrating the federal plan with the provincial strategies and align the vision
and goals at the national level so Pakistan can project a unified stance to the
international community. For this to happen, the federal IT ministry will have to

158 “Internet Offers,” Telenor Pakistan, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.telenor.com.pk/personal/telenor/offers/internet-‐offers
159 “Facebook Flex,” Telenor Pakistan, accessed March 22, 2018.
https://www.telenor.com.pk/facebook-‐flex
160 Salman Siddiqui, “Pakistan’s middle class continues to grow at rapid pace,” The Express
Tribune online, last modified May 2, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1398602/pakistans-‐

middle-‐class-‐continues-‐grow-‐rapid-‐pace/
161 Umair Javed, “A Nation of Traders,” Dawn online, last modified January 29, 2018.
58
rise above partisan politics and foster collaborations between all IT departments
and boards. Pakistan’s tech community does not mobilise itself along
geographical lines, after all. It represents the whole of the country. In fact, the
modern tech work philosophy is based on collaborations and remote
workspaces. It would be silly then that the local governments work on e-‐
governance separately and in competition.

The government also needs to focus on more G2C and C2G e-‐governance services
to build ownership of these schemes among the public. Intra-‐government
services are beneficial but unless the government engages the public by offering
information and role in decision-‐making processes, the people will treat e-‐
government as they treat traditional government: with suspicion and cynicism.
Better Internet connectivity, lower prices for Internet use, and cheaper digital
devices will together help get more people to connect to the World Wide Web.
The governments could look to fund primary and secondary schools for IT
equipment to encourage digital literacy. Local manufacturing could be promoted
to bring prices of technology down.

The government should also look at securing its information and the public’s
data online. Data protection and privacy laws should be enacted to ensure safety
and security of digital information.

Finally, a consistent political will to pursue and develop e-‐governance in the
country is required. It would require across-‐the-‐board consensus to minimise
political interference and maintain a steady pace of progress.

59

60
Chapter 7
Growth in E-‐commerce shows Promising Signs for Local Digital
Services Industry

Waqas Naeem

The digital services industry in Pakistan is growing. From ride sharing to buying
real estate and ordering food delivery, Pakistanis are increasingly using digital
services in their everyday life. The rise in e-‐commerce has attracted international
players such as Careem and Daraz, encouraged homegrown enterprises such as
Zameen and homeshopping.pk, and given a convenient social media-‐based business
model to hundreds of small businesses. Despite the demand, the industry faces
issues related to regulation, taxation and seller protections while consumers are
beginning to ask for data protection and privacy guarantees from the government.

Introduction

Pakistanis bought one million items from Daraz.pk, the Pakistan branch of the
UK government-‐funded online marketplace Daraz, and helped the company earn
Rs. 3 billion in revenues during its 2017 Big Friday sale – the local equivalent of
Black Friday sale, which marks the beginning of the Christmas shopping season
internationally.162 163 164

The online shopping platform, developed by German company Rocket Internet,
was only launched in 2012 and first imported the Black Friday-‐inspired
shopping holiday concept to Pakistan in 2015.165 166 The meteoric rise in its
popularity and sales within two years is indicative of the growing interest and
familiarity in e-‐commerce and online retail in Pakistan.

According to the State Bank of Pakistan, the size of Pakistan’s local e-‐commerce
market in terms of pre-‐paid transactions (through online debit/credit card and
m-‐wallets) was Rs. 9.8 billion or around $93 million up until June 2017.167 This
should only reflect a small segment of the actual e-‐commerce market since the
Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) suggests “more than 95% of e-‐
commerce transactions are done through a cash-‐on-‐delivery system.168 This has

162 “Daraz records revenue of Rs 3 billion during Big Friday sale,” Dawn online, last modified
December 4, 2017. https://www.dawn.com/news/1373601

163 “About Us,” Daraz.pk, accessed March 24, 2018. https://www.daraz.pk/about/
164 “Black Friday,” Daraz.pk, accessed March 24, 2018. https://www.daraz.pk/black-‐friday/
165 ibid.
166 Osman Husain, “After a stuttering start, Rocket Internet’s Daraz ecommerce marketplace is
finally poised to take off,” The Express Tribune, last modified October 2, 2015.
https://tribune.com.pk/story/966196/after-‐a-‐stuttering-‐start-‐rocket-‐internets-‐daraz-‐
ecommerce-‐marketplace-‐is-‐finally-‐poised-‐to-‐take-‐off/
167 “Special Section 2: Online Payment Platforms in Pakistan – A Case of B2C E-‐Commerce,” State
Bank of Pakistan, accessed on March 24, 2018.

http://www.sbp.org.pk/reports/quarterly/fy18/First/Special-‐Section-‐2.pdf
61
led experts to estimate the total size of the Pakistani e-‐commerce market at
around Rs. 65 billion or $600 million.169

State bank data shows that Pakistani consumers also made transactions worth
Rs. 20.8 billion on international e-‐commerce websites.170 The number of mobile
wallet (m-‐wallet) accounts in the country reached the 20-‐million mark, with
nearly Rs. 2 billion worth of transactions, in 2016.171 With 146 million cellphone
subscribers and 25.6% Internet penetration, it is likely that e-‐commerce will
continue to grow in Pakistan.172 The growth in online business activity is also
putting pressure on the government to offer a policy and regulatory framework
for the industry.

Policy/Regulatory Background

The ministry of commerce finalised a policy framework for e-‐commerce in
January 2018 after deliberating on it for a two-‐year period.173 It is going to be
approved by the prime minister reportedly before it can be enacted. The policy
and its associated action plans include a licensing and regulatory regime for e-‐
commerce entities, supportive financial services, and consumer data protection
laws, according to a news report.

Meanwhile, the Pakistan Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) 2016 provides
punishments for electronic fraud.174 The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has
taken action against fraudulent online businesses recently but it is not clear if
this was done under the PECA provisions.175 The National Response Centre for
Cyber Crime at the FIA lists financial fraud in its categories of cyber crime.176

169 Adam Dawood, “SBP Data shows Pakistan’s E-‐commerce Market crossed $600 Million Mark in
2017,” ProPakistani online, last modified February 27, 2018.

https://propakistani.pk/2018/02/27/sbp-‐data-‐shows-‐pakistans-‐e-‐commerce-‐market-‐crossed-‐
600-‐million-‐mark-‐2017/
170 “Special Section 2: Online Payment Platforms in Pakistan – A Case of B2C E-‐Commerce,” State
Bank of Pakistan, accessed on March 24, 2018.

http://www.sbp.org.pk/reports/quarterly/fy18/First/Special-‐Section-‐2.pdf
172 “Telecom Indicators,” Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, accessed March 24, 2018.
173 Ghulam Abbas, “Ministry of Commerce finalises e-‐commerce policy,”Profit magazine Pakistan
Today online, last modified January 16, 2018.

https://profit.pakistantoday.com.pk/2018/01/16/ministry-‐of-‐commerce-‐finalises-‐e-‐commerce-‐
policy/
174 “2016 PECA,” Digital Rights Monitor online, accessed March 24, 2018.
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/wp-‐content/uploads/2017/10/2016-‐PECA.pdf
175 Samir Yawar, “FIA Starts Crackdown on Fraudulent Online Stores in Pakistan,” ProPakistani
online, last modified May 5, 2016. https://propakistani.pk/2016/05/05/fia-‐starts-‐crackdown-‐

on-‐fraudulent-‐online-‐stores-‐in-‐pakistan/
176 “Cyber Crime,” Federal Investigation Agency National Response Centre for Cyber Crime,
accessed March 24, 2018. http://www.nr3c.gov.pk/cybercrime.html
62
However, in October 2017 court sentenced three people to five years’
imprisonment under the older Electronic Transaction Order 2002 rather than
PECA.177

The e-‐commerce policy is also likely to resolve taxation uncertainties
surrounding e-‐commerce in the country. The federal government levied a tax on
e-‐commerce companies in 2018 but provinces can also collect service charges
from e-‐commerce entities, leading to a lack of clarity on tax jurisdictions.178

The Federal Board of Revenue introduced a 0.5% tax on e-‐commerce turnover
through Finance Act 2017, which amended the Tax Ordinance 2001. 179 The
Section 2(38b) of the ordinance now defines an “online marketplace” as “an
information technology platform run by e-‐commerce entity over an electronic
network that acts as a facilitator in transactions that occur between a buyer and
seller.180” E-‐commerce companies have, however, requested the government for
a 10-‐year tax holiday.181

The PTA seems to be supporting the State Bank and other state institutions in
coordinating with cellular mobile networks, which lead the major mobile-‐based
branchless banking services in the country, and technology service providers.
The telecomm regulator is also part of the National Financial Inclusion Strategy,
which aims to increase the number of adults with a bank or m-‐wallet account to
50%.182 The PTA now also issues a Third Party Service Provider license for
interoperability in mobile financial services.183

Main Section

Daraz.pk is not the only thriving online marketplace in Pakistan.
Homeshopping.pk, for example, started out of a bedroom with only a Rs. 10,000
capital investment. Now its turnover stands at nearly one billion rupees and it

177 Rizwan Shehzad, “Cybercrime court gives first judgment in fraud case,” The Express Tribune
online, last modified October 19, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1535122/cybercrime-‐

court-‐gives-‐first-‐judgment-‐fraud-‐case/
178 Shehryar Aziz, “E-‐Commerce landscape faces barriers to expansion in Pakistan,” The Express
Tribune online, last modified September 18, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1509406/e-‐

commerce-‐landscape-‐faces-‐barriers-‐expansion-‐pakistan/
179 “E-‐commerce entities to pay 0.5pc minimum tax,” Pkrevenue.com online, last modified
September 7, 2017. http://www.pkrevenue.com/inland-‐revenue/e-‐commerce-‐entities-‐to-‐pay-‐0-‐

5pc-‐minimum-‐tax/
180 “Income Tax Ordinance, 2001 Amended Upto 30.06.2017,” Federal Board of Revenue,
accessed March 24, 2018.

http://download1.fbr.gov.pk/Docs/2017831181435412IncomeTaxOrdinance2001updatedupto
30.06.2017.pdf
181 Shahzad Paracha, “Leading e-‐commerce companies demand ten-‐year tax holiday from
government,” Profit magazine Pakistan Today online, last modified February 23, 2018.
https://profit.pakistantoday.com.pk/2018/02/23/leading-‐e-‐commerce-‐companies-‐demand-‐ten-‐
year-‐tax-‐holiday-‐from-‐government/
183 ibid.
63
plans to start its own home shopping TV channel.184 The Yayvo marketplace –
owned by courier company TCS – plans to triple its revenue in 2018.185,186 In
2017, Yayvo had expected sales worth Rs. 500 million during its Black Friday-‐
equivalent shopping week.187

These portals have benefitted tremendously from developing marketing
campaigns along national days (such as Pakistan Day or Independence Day,
religious festivals (such as Eid), and dedicated shopping holidays (such as
Black/Big Friday).188 189

These online marketplaces are just one of the five major e-‐commerce players
identified by the State Bank in its first quarter report for 2017-‐18. The major
players include e-‐retailers and online intermediaries.

The e-‐retailers are mostly brand stores that have brick-‐and-‐mortar shops but
have now developed online shops to cater to the Internet users. Fashion brands,
such as Khaadi, Alkaram and Sana Safinaz are some examples.190 191 192 But the
trend is not limited to fashion. Fast food chains and even bookstores, such as
Liberty Books, receive orders online and deliver throughout Pakistan.

The so-‐called online intermediaries are the earliest examples of the use of the
Internet in Pakistan as a vehicle for commerce.

Some of these started as informal information-‐sharing networks but have now
acquired the status of classified advertising websites serving millions of
Pakistanis. The popular PakWheels.com started as an online discussion forum
for car enthusiasts in 2003 but quickly developed into a website that allows
users to buy and sell new and used vehicles and automobile parts. The forum
part is still intact but now it is just one part of an array of services such as
insurance quotes, auction sheet verification, and car loan comparisons.193

184 “Realising Digital Pakistan: An Internet not for the few, but for the many January 2016,”
Telenor Pakistan, accesed March 24, 2018.
https://www.telenor.com.pk/media/wysiwyg/TELENOR_Realizing_Digital_Pakistan_Jan_2016.p
df
185 “About Us,” Yayvo.com, accessed March 25, 2018. http://yayvo.com/about-‐us
186 Adam Dawood, “SBP Data shows Pakistan’s E-‐commerce Market crossed $600 Million Mark in
2017,” ProPakistani online, last modified February 27, 2018.

https://propakistani.pk/2018/02/27/sbp-‐data-‐shows-‐pakistans-‐e-‐commerce-‐market-‐crossed-‐
600-‐million-‐mark-‐2017/
187 Sumaira Jajja, “Black or not, Friday sales boom in Pakistan,” Dawn online, last modified
November 25, 2017. https://www.dawn.com/news/1372743
188 Muneeb Ahmad, “These websites are offering March 23rd deals in Pakistan,” TechJuice online,
last modified March 22, 2018. https://www.techjuice.pk/websites-‐offering-‐march-‐23rd-‐deals-‐

pakistan/
189 Faizan Javed, “Online Eid shopping gaining popularity,” The Nation online, last modified June
15, 2017. https://nation.com.pk/15-‐Jun-‐2017/online-‐eid-‐shopping-‐gaining-‐popularity

190 “Home,” Khaadi.com, accessed March 25, 2018. https://www.khaadi.com/
191 “Home,” Alkaram Studio, accessed March 25, 2018. https://www.alkaramstudio.com/
192 “Home,” Sana Safinaz, acccessed March 25, 2018. https://www.sanasafinaz.com/
193 “About Us,” PakWheels.com, accessed March 25, 2018.
https://www.pakwheels.com/main/about_us
64
Like PakWheels, Zameen.com offers a forum and blog section alongside its main
service of a property portal to connect buyers and sellers of real estate. Users can
search for commercial plots, homes, and rentals. The portal, launched in 2006, is
backed by venture capital.194

While PakWheels and Zameen cover two high-‐demand yet niche markets, the
website that has perhaps done the most to introduce the concept of online
classifieds to the common Pakistani consciousness is OLX. The Pakistani-‐
alternative to Craigslist, OLX allows people to put up free classified ads on its
website to sell their goods and products. It was launched in 2011 and claims to
control 90% of the online classifieds market share.195

While the online portals help connect buyers and sellers, the intermediaries
might not exactly fall under e-‐commerce. OLX-‐based transactions, for example,
are off-‐site and offline, managed entirely by the buyer and seller themselves and
often involving cash. PakWheels and Zameen are no different.

This is perhaps why online retail is still only one percent of Pakistan’s total retail
sales, as it relies mostly on the aforementioned online marketplaces.196 Still, the
State Bank has identified over 500 local merchants who use banking channels to
accept payments and it is believed the e-‐commerce market will hit the $1 billion
mark by 2020.197 198

A new entrant but certainly a big player in the digital service industry is the
“transportation firms”, popularly known as ride-‐sharing apps. Careem, the
Dubai-‐based ride sharing platform, officially launched in Pakistan in 2016 and
has since expanded from two to 12 cities; it aims to create one million jobs by
2020.199 Similarly, Uber Pakistan launched in March 2016, but its services are
limited to four cities: Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, and Rawalpindi.200 201

Both Uber and Careem got into regulatory tussles with the government in early
2017 and faced temporary suspensions, but these issues seem to be moving

194 “About Us,” Zameen.com, accessed March 25, 2018.
https://www.zameen.com/about/aboutus.html
195 Abbas Naqvi, “OLX – Thousands of products in the palm of your hand,” Profit magazine
Pakistan Today online, last modified February 6, 2017.

https://profit.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/02/06/olx-‐thousands-‐of-‐products-‐in-‐the-‐palm-‐of-‐
your-‐hand/
196 BR Research, “It’s the splurge season,” Business Recorder online, last modified November 16,
2017. https://www.brecorder.com/2017/11/16/381632/its-‐the-‐splurge-‐season/
197 Usman Sheikh, “Pakistan’s e-‐commerce market size set to cross $1b this year,” The Express
Tribune online, last modified March 19, 2018. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1663707/2-‐

pakistans-‐e-‐commerce-‐market-‐size-‐set-‐cross-‐1b-‐year/
198 “Our cities,” Careem, accessed March 25, 2018. https://www.careem.com/en-‐ae/cities/
199 Talha bin Hamid, “In Conversation with Junaid Iqbal, CEO, Careem Pakistan,” Aurora online,
last modified April 18, 2017. https://aurora.dawn.com/news/1141986

200 “Welcome to Uber Pakistan,” Uber Blog, last modified February 6, 2017.
https://www.uber.com/en-‐PK/blog/welcome-‐to-‐uber-‐pakistan/
201 “Islamabad and Rawalpindi: Your uberGO is Arriving Now!” Uber Blog, last modified April 27,
2017. https://www.uber.com/en-‐PK/blog/islamabad-‐and-‐rawalpindi-‐your-‐ubergo-‐is-‐arriving-‐
now/
65
towards getting resolved.202 They continue to face protests from taxi driver
unions.203

Among other digital services, e-‐banking solutions offered by major banks,
streaming music app Patari, and food delivery services, such as FoodPanda, are
notable. Finally, many small businesses are using social networks such as
Facebook and Twitter to run their businesses.204 The State Bank report points
out those customers usually place order directly through the social media pages
and get products delivered to their homes. Businesses are also using online
marketing through these social networks to reach more customers.205

One major challenge to the growth of e-‐commerce and consequently the digital
services industry is that a majority of the Pakistani population is unbanked, that
is they do not have valid bank accounts. Only 36 million people have or use a
debit or credit card so instead of –-‐pre-‐payment online, most payments are cash-‐
oriented.206 This means e-‐commerce retailers do not have payments up front
when they are shipping out orders.207 It also means they cannot afford to not
offer a cash-‐on-‐delivery payment option. M-‐wallets and branchless banking
options, such as Telenor’s EasyPaisa and Mobilink’s Jazz Cash, have helped
reduce the non-‐banking population. Also EasyPaisa, launched in 2011, had 9.2
million accounts and transactions worth Rs. 645 billion in 2016.208 Some online
marketplaces have linked up with these mobile-‐based payment options to
facilitate more customers.

Meanwhile, the government is also devising a National Financial Inclusion
Strategy which aims to increase number of adults with a bank account or m-‐
wallet account to 50%.209

Even with more bank accounts and debit/credit cards, the e-‐commerce entities
need payment gateways to process payments through these cards. For a long
time Pakistan did not have a payment gateway. Since 2013, four commercial

202 “Punjab govt’s new policy likely to increase Careem, Uber fares,” The Express Tribune online,
last modified November 1, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1546985/1-‐punjab-‐govts-‐new-‐

policy-‐likely-‐increase-‐careem-‐uber-‐fares/
203 “Scores of Islamabad’s cabbies protest against online taxi services,” The Express Tribune
online, last modified August 20, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1486586/scores-‐

islamabads-‐cabbies-‐protest-‐online-‐taxi-‐services/
204 Nada Zain, “How Pakistani Art Crafters Are Using Facebook,” TechJuice online, last modified
July 12, 2014.

205 Farooq Tirmizi, “Marketing tools: Using Facebook ads, some businesses get off to flying start,”
The Express Tribune online, last modified September 24, 2012.

https://tribune.com.pk/story/441336/marketing-‐tools-‐using-‐facebook-‐ads-‐some-‐businesses-‐
get-‐off-‐to-‐flying-‐start/
206 Shehryar Aziz, “E-‐Commerce landscape faces barriers to expansion in Pakistan,” The Express
Tribune online, last modified September 18, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1509406/e-‐

commerce-‐landscape-‐faces-‐barriers-‐expansion-‐pakistan/
207 Syed Amir Haleem, “Opening up to onine payment systems,” Aurora online, accessed March
25, 2018. https://aurora.dawn.com/news/1141404

208 “Annual Report 2016,”Telenor Bank, accessed March 25, 2018.
http://www.telenorbank.pk/assets/pdf/annual-‐reports/AnnualReport2016-‐Final.pdf
66
financial institutions have set up payment gateways, which have helped local
businesses.210 According to the 2017 PTA annual report, the government is also
spending Rs. 200 million to develop an e-‐gateway system at the State Bank,
which will resolve Pakistan’s payment gateway issues.

Another important issue faced by the digital services industry is ensuring the
protection and privacy of consumers’ data.

Ethical hackers have previously identified vulnerabilities in both PakWheels and
Zameen.com, and food delivery services are not mindful of privacy of personal
information.211 The website of a government department tasked with citizen
registration has been hacked multiple times in the past.212 In November 2017, a
malware attack was reported on Telenor Pakistan.213

While PECA and the Electronic Transaction Ordinance 2002 have provisions
against unauthorised access to information, such as a hacking incident, these
laws do not have specific provisions for data protection and privacy.214 A data
protection bill, drafted in 2015, was never passed into law.215 On the other hand,
PECA allows the state leeway in recording, storing, and using the personal
information of citizens.216 The Pakistani government has been accused in the
past of secretly handing over the personal information of its citizens to foreign
governments.217

Theft of personal data from point-‐of-‐service locations and bank ATM machines
has also raised alarm among the Pakistani public to the vulnerability of their
digital data.218

Civil society organisations have demanded better data protection laws to ensure
private information of citizens is safe online. 219 This would also result in

210 Sibtain Jiwani, “Choosing the best payment gateway in Pakistan,” Smartchoice (blog), last
modified July 22, 2015. https://smartchoice.pk/blog/2015/07/choosing-‐the-‐best-‐payment-‐
gateway-‐in-‐pakistan/
211 Talal Raza, “No one to protect digital identity: how vulnerable is consumer data in Pakistan?”
Digital Rights Monitor online, last modified November 23, 2017.

http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/no-‐one-‐to-‐protect-‐digital-‐identity-‐how-‐vulnerable-‐is-‐consumer-‐
data-‐in-‐pakistan/
212 Usama Khilji, “Data protection and privacy,” Dawn online, last modified December 19, 2017.
213 Talal Raza, “Telenor Pakistan comes under a cyber-‐attack; the extent of damage remains
unclear,” Digital Rights Monitor online, last modified November 15, 2017.
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/telenor-‐pakistan-‐comes-‐under-‐a-‐cyber-‐attack-‐the-‐extent-‐of-‐
damage-‐remains-‐unclear/
214 “Electronic Data Protection in Pakistan,” Bytes for All, Pakistan, accessed March 25, 2018.
http://digitalrightsmonitor.pk/wp-‐content/uploads/2018/01/Data_Protection_in_Pakistan.pdf
215 Ibid.
216 ibid.
217 Bytes for All, “Pakistan government’s alleged leaking of citizens’ private data is unacceptable,”
IFEX online, last modified June 22, 2017. https://www.ifex.org/pakistan/2017/06/21/leak-‐

private-‐data/
218 “Hundreds of Pakistanis lose millions in major ATM skimming fraud,” Geo.tv, last modified
December 4, 2017. https://www.geo.tv/latest/170648-‐hundreds-‐of-‐karachiites-‐lose-‐millions-‐in-‐

major-‐atm-‐skimming-‐fraud
67
customers more trustworthy and confident of their online transactions.220 The
government is likely to include provisions related to consumer data protection in
the draft e-‐commerce policy, since the working groups had reportedly suggested
the inclusion of these.221 However, it will only be known for certain once the
policy’s draft is made public.

Finally, the digital divide in Pakistan offers an obstacle to the growth of the
digital services industry. Daraz, for example, makes 50% of its sales through
customers based in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad.222 The three cities, even
though some of Pakistan’s biggest, account for only just over 15% of the
country’s total population. 223 The Pakistani government has made a goal to
increase Internet penetration to 50% a part of its Vision 2025 policy
document.224

Reflections

The country appears to be heading towards further growth in its e-‐commerce
and digital services industry. As more people begin to become familiar with
online shopping and prepayment methods, the demand will encourage more e-‐
retailers and online marketplaces. The business interest has already developed a
lobbying push on the government to better regulate the digital services industry.
However, this lobbying is mostly related to pro-‐business reform and does not
always take into account the concerns of the consumers.

The Pakistani public still only has a distant view of data vulnerabilities, and
anxieties related to data protection are often temporary and linked with the next
new data breach. So far, the dominant online classifieds market is managed by
consumers themselves, which affords them a stronger sense of control and
resultant confidence in the financial transactions. Most of the data insecurity is
directed towards global Internet companies such as Google and Facebook due to
the presence of targeted ads and browser behaviour, not local companies.
However, it is likely that consumers will start to develop a stronger voice
regarding digital data protection and privacy as the digital footprint of the
average Pakistani citizen increases and as e-‐retail’s market share grows. The

219 “Need stressed to introduce data protection laws,” The Express Tribune online, last modified
December 8, 2017. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1660359/1-‐online-‐shopping-‐consumer-‐rights-‐

fairer-‐digital-‐marketplaces/
220 “Online shopping: Consumer rights for fairer digital marketplaces,” The Express Tribune
online, last modified March 15, 2018. https://tribune.com.pk/story/1660359/1-‐online-‐

shopping-‐consumer-‐rights-‐fairer-‐digital-‐marketplaces/
221 Ghulam Abbas, “Ministry of Commerce finalises e-‐commerce policy,”Profit magazine Pakistan
Today online, last modified January 16, 2018.

https://profit.pakistantoday.com.pk/2018/01/16/ministry-‐of-‐commerce-‐finalises-‐e-‐commerce-‐
policy/
222 Amber Arshad, “Aspiring to Amazon,” Aurora online, accessed March 25, 2018.
https://aurora.dawn.com/news/1142029
223 Mubarak Zeb Khan, “20pc of Pakistanis live in 10 cities, census reveals,” Dawn online, last
modified August 29, 2017. https://www.dawn.com/news/1354653

224 “Goals Vision 2025,” Ministry of Planning Development & Reform, Government of Pakistan,
accessed March 25, 2018. http://pc.gov.pk/vision/goals
68
public demand will be necessary to force corporations and e-‐commerce
companies to enact better security measures.

Recommendations

Pakistan was ranked 120 out of 144 countries in the United Nations Conference
on Trade and Development B2C E-‐Commerce Index 2017, down from 110 in
2015.225 The report lists Pakistan among countries with very low readiness to
business-‐to-‐consumer e-‐commerce. It means the country needs to make a giant
effort to match up with other countries around the world in developing its digital
services industry.

On the business side, as Telenor’s 2016 Realising Digital Pakistan report
mentions, an elimination of device and data taxes and a reduction in restrictive
legislation will encourage more investment in the digital economy. This is going
to be tricky, since the government is also interested in including e-‐commerce in
its revenue-‐generation plans.
More mentoring and funding, either from private or government sources, for
technology and startups can help more local businesses to take part in e-‐
commerce. Most digital services will require technology to run their operations.
This might include web stores, warehouses for data and products, and online
customer support systems. The government can also help with some of the
digital infrastructure, either by encouraging import of technology through
subsidies and removal of import duties or fostering indigenous production.

For consumers, civil society organisations must keep on the pressure on the
government to enact data privacy and protection laws and to get businesses to
comply with these laws so that consumers know what is happening to their
information.

225 “Unctad B2C E-‐commerce Index 2017,” United Nations Conference on Trade and Development
(UNCTAD), accessed March 24, 2018.

http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/tn_unctad_ict4d09_en.pdf
69
70

71

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The Internet Governance and Digital Rights

Table of Content

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