Pakistan blocks WordPress, outrage erupts online

Wordpress.com is inaccessible to internet users in Pakistan, after the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority asked SIPs to block access to the blogging platform. While self-hosted WordPress blogs still work, free blogs hosted on the platform are now are now inaccessible to internet users in Pakistan, Techcrunch reported.

Internet users in Pakistan see a message, 'this website is not accessible' when trying to access blogs and sites hosted on wordpress.com.

According to Hackread, the blogging platform was blocked for ”National Security Related Issues.”, as it was used by the Tehreek Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a terrorist group active in Pakistan. The PTA does not have software to ban specific domains.

WordPress is the 34’th most visited web site in Pakistan, according to Alexa. In the past, the Pakistan government has blocked Facebook, Flickr, IMDb, Twitter and Wikipedia temporarily for hosting content that it sees as blasphemous and inflammatory.

ProPakistani.pk reports that the block is temporary, the site will be unblocked tomorrow. Internet users from Pakistan took to Twitter to express outrage over the block.