The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has informed the Islamabad High Court (IHC) that selectively blocking individual content on major social media platforms is technically difficult because these services use encrypted connections.
In its report submitted in Writ Petition No. 4163 of 2026, PTA said leading platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Google and X, use the secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) to transmit data between users and their servers. Encryption prevents intermediary network operators from identifying the specific content or internet address being accessed.
PTA explained that telecom operators can identify the platform or web server with which a user is communicating but cannot view the particular resource being accessed through an encrypted connection. Consequently, blocking an individual post, video or page on an HTTPS-based platform may not be technically possible without assistance from the company concerned.
The authority said it could approach social media companies through official channels and request the removal of specific content. However, such requests are assessed by the platforms under their own community guidelines and terms of service, and requests not meeting their standards may be rejected.
PTA said the remaining technical option could involve blocking access to an entire website or platform on a best-effort basis. It cautioned that such a measure would also disrupt access to lawful and appropriate content and must therefore be considered in light of legal authority, proportionality and the wider consequences of the restriction.
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