Govt mulls blocking porn sites

KATHMANDU, AUG 13 - Internet surfers will soon have to scale the telecom firewall to access porn sites in Nepal. Nepal Telecommunications Authority at the behest of the Home Ministry is preparing to block pornographic materials on websites.

Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA) is working on the same through internet service providers (ISP) and telecom operators providing GPRS facility. NTA has been working in this regard in coordination with the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Science and Technology and Cyber Cell of the Nepal Police. It has said that it will implement this new provision after one week.


“Since the Electronic Transaction Act has banned publication and display of such sites, we will soon reach a conclusion on this provision and ask ISPs to block porn sites,” said Kailash Prasad Neupane, spokesperson of the authority. He said the government had taken this initiative as the trend of surfing porn sites had increased significantly in recent years, which he says has adversely affected the Nepali society.

The NTA is also planning to add new terms and conditions in the licensing of ISPs which will prevent them from making such sites available to general subscribers. “We will add additional terms and conditions in the licence too. ISPs will be forbidden from allowing access to porn sites to their customers,” said Neupane.

Telecom authorities had started the process in this regard last month following the request from the Home Ministry. On Wednesday, it held a meeting with government authorities concerned and Internet Service Providers Association of Nepal (ISPAN).

“We will also assist the NTA in sorting out such sites,” said SSP Mahesh Singh Kathayat, head of the IT Division, Police Headquarters. “ISPs will block the sites recommended by its regulatory body NTA.”

There are 44 ISPs including three telecom service operators—Nepal Telecom, Spice Nepal and United Telecom—providing data and internet service.

“Even though the provision affects our business, we are ready to block sites keeping in mind the welfare of the society,” said Binay Bohara, president of ISPAN. “Initially, we plan to block sites containing pornographic materials in an experimental basis following the evaluation both by the NTA and the ISPs.”

However, IT experts have said it is impossible to block all porn sites and there is process to have an exact measurement to segregate what is porn and what is not. They said around 30 to 40 percent of the total internet users visit websites for pornographic contents globally and Nepali users are a part of it.