Users must register VPNs or face disconnection and legal action: PTA.

Users are authorized to register their VPNs or face disconnection & legal action by PTA.

Users must register VPNs or face disconnection and legal action: PTA.

Users are strictly authorized to register their VPNs or they shall face disconnection & legal action by PTA. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, a state owned enterprise responsible for the regulation of establishment, operation and maintenance of telecommunications in Pakistan has started boycotting IP addresses using unregistered Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), directing all such users to get their VPNs registered as soon as possible.

According to the authentic and confirmed resources, a good number of corporate connections have been blocked due to the use of VPNs in a bid to block grey traffic and illegal Voice over IP (VoIP) companies working as call centers and doing data entry operations.

On condition of unexpected namelessness appears by the user, that is technically referred to as anonymity, a PTA official told that the authority has deployed a sophisticated system to curb grey traffic by detecting unregistered VPNs.

A notable number of companies in Pakistan are operating call centers through VPNs thus pretending to be working in the US or other countries.

It all falls under the grey traffic category, however, the IP addresses are currently being blocked for corporate clients of different Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

The deadline for the registration is 30th June 2020 and those failing to comply with the directives will have to face legal action if they are using VPNs for any illegal activities.

The ISPs have been notified of the development, directing them to convey the message to all corporate clients using unregistered VPNs. 

Besides that , the use of any mode of communication such as VPN by means of which communication becomes hidden or encrypted is a violation of PTA regulations.

Moreover, users which are required to use VPN for their legitimate purposes must register their VPN with PTA through their respective Internet Service Provider with having known the deadline as 30-06-2020.