Islamabad, Sep 9 (PTI) - Pakistani authorities have reportedly engaged in widespread surveillance of millions of citizens, including journalists and prominent politicians, according to a recent report by Amnesty International. The report, titled 'Shadows of Control: Censorship and Mass Surveillance in Pakistan', reveals that Pakistan's extensive monitoring network has been established using technology sourced from both Chinese and Western companies.
The investigation, conducted over a year in collaboration with Paper Trail Media, DER STANDARD, Follow the Money, The Globe and Mail, Justice For Myanmar, InterSecLab, and the Tor Project, highlights that Pakistani authorities have allegedly conducted unlawful surveillance of regular citizens, journalists, and politicians. Amnesty International notes that this expansion of mass surveillance relies on a network of companies based in Germany, France, the UAE, China, Canada, and the United States.
This elaborate system involves the use of the Lawful Intercept Management System (LIMS), which enables the Pakistani Armed Forces and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to monitor a significant portion of the population’s digital activity through local telecommunications providers. The report uncovers how Pakistani authorities have reportedly acquired sophisticated foreign technology, including the latest firewall, Web Monitoring System (WMS 2.0), and the LIMS.
The WMS firewall initially employed technology from the Canadian company Sandvine, now AppLogic Networks. However, following Sandvine's divestment in 2023, a new version of the firewall was developed using technology from China-based Geedge Networks, incorporating hardware and software from the US-based Niagara Networks and France's Thales.
According to Amnesty, the LIMS utilises technology from the German company Utimaco, distributed by the Emirati company Datafusion. “Pakistan’s Web Monitoring System and Lawful Intercept Management System function like watchtowers, persistently intruding into the lives of regular citizens,” said Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International. Callamard further emphasized that data from texts, emails, calls, and internet usage are under constant scrutiny, posing a severe threat to freedom of expression and access to information.
The report criticizes the pursuit of profit in international markets, highlighting the human rights violations resulting from this unchecked surveillance. The persistence of these surveillance tools, driven by public funding and foreign tech, has reportedly been instrumental in silencing dissent.
The LIMS is reportedly installed across the country’s telecommunications infrastructure, as mandated by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA). This allows military and intelligence entities to access consumer data, including phone calls, text messages, and internet browsing activities.
Amnesty International also emphasizes that the WMS 2.0 system strengthens online censorship by enabling authorities to block VPNs and websites deemed unlawful. The report argues that the Pakistani legal system fails to offer adequate protection against this pervasive state surveillance.
Amnesty claims that targeted mass surveillance is possible via the LIMS system, which can intercept phone location data, calls, and messages of individuals once a phone number is submitted by state agents, including ISI officers.
The report highlights the systemic lack of legal and technical safeguards in the deployment of these surveillance technologies, deeming the LIMS a tool of indiscriminate surveillance, potentially affecting over four million people at any time.
Using commercial trade datasets, Amnesty tracked the first version of WMS to 2018, using technology from Sandvine, and documented its installation among three Pakistani companies - Inbox Technologies, SN Skies Pvt Ltd, and A Hamson Inc., all allegedly engaged in government partnerships. A data leak, identified as the Geedge dataset, revealed the subsequent replacement of WMS 1.0 with Geedge Networks' technology by 2023, establishing WMS 2.0. The operationalization of this system is reportedly backed by technology from Niagara Networks and Thales.
Amnesty International posits that the Geedge Networks technology represents an exported, commercialized version of China's "Great Firewall," a comprehensive censorship tool renowned for its deployment in China and now reportedly introduced to other nations.
(Only the headline of this report may have been reworked by Editorji; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
