Twitter down across Pakistan, Twitterati blame govt for throttling service

For unspecified reasons, micro-blogging site Twitter has stopped working in Pakistan. However, the users are able to access their social media account using the Virtual Private Network (VPN).

"Disruption to Twitter and Periscope registered across Pakistan with impact to multiple networks; incident ongoing," said NetBlocks.org, an internet's observatory which tracks disruptions and shutdowns across the world.

"So lots in Pakistan saying Twitter has stopped working for them and they are having to use it via VPN. I'm using it without VPN right now but its extremely slow & barely anything is loading. Very strange," said a Twitter user named Ammar Rashid.

Another internet observatory named the Downdetector showed a live outage in Pakistan.

Some users in Pakistan have gone on to suggest that the disruption is caused by the Pakistan government.
 

"@Twitter is down in Pakistan only. It seems the Government is throttling the service," said a user.

Few users said that the internet is being blocked to impede the SAATH Virtual Conference, being held to discuss the issue of enforced disappearances of minorities in Pakistan.

"Can't connect to Zoom either. Some people are claiming both have been blocked on most ISPs because of the #SAATHVirtualConf2020. Don't know if this is true, but if so then it seems pretty counterproductive since I only found out about the conference because of this," said Reema Khurshid, another Twitter user from Pakistan.

The Twitter support team is yet to put a word on the matter.