Pakistan’s ‘VPN use un-Islamic’ edict by top religious body draws widespread backlash

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s leading constitutional religious body came under severe criticism after it issued an edict terming the use of Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to access blocked content on the internet as ‘un-Islamic’.

The unprecedented pro­clamation by the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII), which advises parliament on aligning legislation with Islamic teachings, enraged digital rights activists as well as some religious scholars.