Pakistan has banned 5 dating mobile applications, including Grindr and Tinder, claiming their indecent and immoral content.
On Tuesday, the telecom watchdog said that the country restricted access of people to Tagged, Skout, Tinder, SayHi, and Grindr when these live streaming and dating apps caused local laws violation.
The country’s telecom watchdog said Tuesday that it blocked access to Tinder, Tagged, Skout, Grindr and SayHi after the dating and live streaming apps fell afoul of local laws https://t.co/NkLimO90OQ
— CNN Business (@CNNBusiness) September 2, 2020
The PTA (Pakistan Telecommunication Authority) described that the country had issued notices to the firms and requested them to eradicate moderate live streaming content and dating services on their platforms. Those firms haven’t answered in the mentioned time, so blocked, the authority said.
However, the watchdog continued that it can reconsider the ban if these mobile apps obey the local constitution and moderate immoral and indecent content.
Grindr and Tinder are well popular in the Western countries and especially in the United States, but these dating platforms have far less traction in religious Pakistan.
Source: Web
Number of downloads in Pakistan vs. the United States
In the last 12 months, the dating app, Tinder, downloaded around 440,000 times in Pakistan as compared to thirteen million times in America within the same time period, according to Sensor Tower (data analytics company).
On the other side, the Grindr app, which explains itself as the biggest social networking mobile application for bi, trans, gay, and queer communities, was downloaded in Pakistan around 300,000 times while comparing to around two million downloads in the U.S. in the last year.
In Pakistan, SayHi and Tagged have been downloaded around 300,000 times, and another dating platform, Skout downloaded 100,000 times in the previous year, said Sensor Tower.
Tinder app, owned by Match, didn’t abruptly answer to a request for comment. Furthermore, The Meet Group and Grindr, which owns Skout and Tagged, also didn’t quickly answer to a request for comment.
The telecommunication watchdog of Pakistan even tried to ban TikTok, the world’s most popular video-sharing platform, which is currently having trouble in the United States.
The government authority, in July, issued the final threat to the video app TikTok over vulgar, obscene, and immoral content tracked on the app. The regulator, last week, described that it had a meeting with TikTok’s senior management and the TikTok had erased indecent content.
