s one had always feared, the arbitrary regulation and internet shutdowns in Pakistan have inflicted severe losses on the country’s economy. A recent report by Top10VPN.com, that places Pakistan’s economic losses at $1.62 billion in 2024 due to these shutdowns, should be a wake-up call. The report is a reminder of how government-imposed regulatory actions are costing more than just access to information. They are choking the lifeline of Pakistan’s burgeoning digital economy, forcing freelancers, entrepreneurs and businesses of all sizes to pay the price for decisions beyond their control.

The methodology behind the Cost of Shutdown Tool, developed by NetBlocks, is rather transparent. The calculation of potential losses is based on economic indicators, including GDP contribution from digital services, the percentage of the population affected and the duration of the shutdown. Pakistan’s digital economy has grown substantially over the past few years. Thousands of freelancers and tech startups are entering the global market. Arbitrary actions like use of Deep Packet Inspection toolkits, popularly known as the ‘firewall’ are more than a temporary inconvenience. The COST shows that internet shutdowns and arbitrary regulation paralyse economies, particularly in Pakistan, where the digital sphere offers an avenue for economic growth.

Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, the country’s telecom regulator tasked with safeguarding the quality of service and protecting consumer rights, seems more invested in playing defence for arbitrary internet shutdowns and arbitrary regulatory actions than addressing the actual problem. Rather than focusing on improving infrastructure or ensuring uninterrupted connectivity, much of PTA’s time is spent churning out “investigations” that blame VPN users for network slowdowns. According to its logic, it’s not the government-imposed blackouts or firewall experiments but the people trying to access blocked content, who are responsible for the country’s digital woes. This narrative shifts the blame from policy failures to the users struggling to stay connected in an increasingly censored digital space.

The assertion that individual VPN use leads to widespread internet slowdowns lacks substantial evidence. VPNs are designed to operate efficiently, without significantly impacting overall internet performance. Cloudflare’s VPN service, Warp, for instance, is engineered to enhance browsing speed by optimising data transmission routes.

In another move that borders on the absurd, the IT and Telecom Ministry is now facilitating the entry of Starlink — Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service —supposedly to improve connectivity in Pakistan. The idea of bringing high-speed satellite internet to remote areas sounds like a much-needed step towards modernisation, but this raises a critical question: if the government’s prized ‘firewall’ and content regulation mechanisms are meant to safeguard the public, how will that work with a direct-to-satellite service like Starlink? You can’t block a satellite connection with a locally installed firewall. It seems that the IT Ministry and the PTA have invited a technology that renders their own regulation tools obsolete.

One can’t help wondering: if the grand plan all along was to bring in direct-to-satellite internet, what was the point of spending enormous amounts of money and squandering political capital on building and testing a firewall in the first place? The contradiction is glaring. On one hand, the government restricts digital access on the pretext of protecting the citizens, yet on the other, it opens the doors to a service that will bypass those restrictions. It’s as if the IT Ministry and the PTA are running two parallel policies: one for control, and another for appearances. The irony would be amusing, only if it weren’t so costly.

If the very expensive Starlink is going to be offered only to select users — government officials, software houses and a privileged few — what’s the point of it, anyway? How does that help the masses who are being left out of the digital economy? Is the government genuinely interested in digital inclusion? These questions highlight a deep inconsistency: if access is still going to be rationed and restricted, then what is the vision for Pakistan’s digital future? It’s starting to look less like progress and more like a tech-savvy way to maintain the same old gatekeeping.

This raises an even bigger issue — the digital divide. If Starlink’s services are limited to elite circles, the digital gap between the privileged and the masses will only grow wider. The very communities that need reliable internet the most — rural populations, underserved areas and marginalised groups — will be left behind. The government’s inconsistent approach to digital policy risks cementing inequality in the digital space. If this continues, Pakistan will find itself with a two-tiered internet system: one for the privileged and one for everyone else.

So is the government ready to push Pakistan as a digital prowess of the region, or even the world, by ensuring policies that are friendly towards the digital economy? Or will it continue to widen the gap under the pretence of technological progress?

The writer is the director and founder of Media Matters for Democracy. He writes on media and digital freedoms, media sustainability and countering misinformation