Pakistani Authorities Accused of Mass Surveillance Targeting Millions: Amnesty International Report
Pakistani authorities have allegedly been conducting mass surveillance on millions of citizens through powerful monitoring systems purchased from foreign companies, raising grave concerns over privacy, free expression, and democratic space in the country, Amnesty International said in a report released Tuesday.
The report, titled “Shadows of Control: Censorship and Mass Surveillance in Pakistan,” alleges that more than four million people may already be under direct monitoring. Those affected include not just ordinary citizens, but also journalists, activists, and political leaders. Amnesty argues that the vast surveillance network has become an entrenched tool of state control in Pakistan’s cyber landscape.
At the center of the allegations is the Lawful Intercept Management System (LIMS), a German-designed technology operated through Pakistan’s telecommunications providers. According to Amnesty, all four major mobile operators have been compelled to connect to LIMS, enabling authorities to monitor up to two percent of their customer base at any given time. The system, produced by the German company Ultimaco, allegedly allows authorities to track internet activity, intercept calls and texts, and store data for review.
Data from LIMS is reportedly fed into the Monitoring Centre Next Generation (McNG), developed by the European firm Datafusion, formerly Trovicor. This platform, Amnesty says, provides officials with sweeping access: records of who called whom and when, details of browsing history, WhatsApp usage, VPN activity, and even geolocation data.
“These technologies allow authorities to map lives in extraordinary detail,” Amnesty’s report warns, adding that the absence of technical and legal safeguards makes citizens especially vulnerable.
Pakistan’s use of mass surveillance, Amnesty recalls, came to wider public attention during a series of leaked phone conversations involving politicians and public figures between 2022 and 2023. In one resulting case before the Islamabad High Court, it emerged that the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) had ordered telecom providers to finance, import, and install LIMS systems for “designated agencies.”
The report further alleges that surveillance operates hand-in-hand with a powerful internet censorship system. Pakistan has deployed the Web Monitoring System (WMS) 2.0, described by Amnesty as a firewall capable of inspecting and blocking two million active internet sessions simultaneously. Originally introduced with U.S. and European technology in 2018, the current iteration was reportedly developed by Chinese company Geedge Networks and modeled on China’s “Great Firewall.”
This system, Amnesty argues, has enabled the PTA to block over 1.4 million URLs since the passage of Pakistan’s cybercrime law in 2016. News outlets, opposition party websites, and investigative platforms have all faced censorship. Internet shutdowns have also become routine, with Amnesty citing at least 77 such incidents between 2016 and 2024, including 24 in 2024 alone—often coinciding with protests, political rallies, or elections.
The watchdog highlights the February 2024 general election as a telling example: internet slowdowns, blocked political party websites, and throttled communication channels “undermined citizens’ ability to access information and exercise democratic rights,” Amnesty said.
The report names four foreign companies—Geedge Networks, Ultimaco, Datafusion, and U.S.-based Niagara Networks—as suppliers whose products allegedly enabled human rights abuses. By facilitating mass surveillance and censorship, Amnesty argues, these firms have become complicit in Pakistan’s digital repression.
“The unchecked deployment of surveillance and censorship technology has created a chilling effect, shrinking civic space and curbing fundamental freedoms,” Amnesty concluded. The group also warned that the forthcoming Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025, which aims to centralize citizens’ social, economic, and governance data, could expand the scope of surveillance dramatically.
Calling for urgent reforms, Amnesty demanded the establishment of robust safeguards to protect citizens’ privacy and freedom of expression. Without them, it warned, Pakistan’s digital future risks becoming defined not by innovation, but by “unchecked digital repression.”
