Pakistan’s Firewall Runs on Western Tech

Amnesty says Pakistan’s 'Lawful Intercept' taps calls and texts across all four mobile operators and its WMS 2.0 firewall blocks about 650,000 links, limiting platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and X. The system uses components from China’s Geedge and Western vendors (Niagara Networks, Thales DIS, Utimaco) plus UAE-based Datafusion. Years-long blackouts in Balochistan show how these tools translate into real repression. — It spotlights how democracies’ firms are embedded in censorship and surveillance supply chains, challenging export-control policy and corporate responsibility claims.