Pakistan YouTube ban affected other nations

Stephen Withers
Monday, 25 February 2008 05:52

Your IT - Home IT

An attempt by Pakistan to block access to YouTube spilled outside its borders and affected much of the world.

According to reports, a Pakistani ISP tried to implement the government edict not by blocking the traffic but by changing network routing so that attempts to reach YouTube were directed to another IP address.

But the way the Internet works meant this route spread outside Pakistan, and YouTube's site became unavailable to a growing number of users around the world until the bogus route announcements were stemmed and YouTube issued new routes to undo the damage.

The YouTube ban, announced by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority last Friday, will run for an indefinite period and is reportedly a response to the presence of what the Pakistan government regards as anti-Islamic videos.

While the Authority did not identify the material that led to the ban, reports suggest it may include the Danish newspaper cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed originally published in 2005, and a forthcoming film by Dutch national Geert Wilders.