ISLAMABAD: The Senate Standing Committee on Interior on Friday asked the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to launch a crackdown against those elements involved in running of fake accounts on Twitter and Facebook and brought them to book.

The committee which met with Senator Rehman Malik in the chair, while taking up the matter of fake Twitter accounts being run in the name of senior leader of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Aitzaz Ahsan, asked the FIA and the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to identify people who were involved in running of Twitter accounts in the name of Ahsan, and devise an effective mechanism to control this matter.

He said that the two fake Twitter accounts being run in the name of Ahsan on Twitter had been blocked by the PTA.

Ahsan has lodged a complaint with the FIA and the PTA several times, and after passage of several months, the accounts had been blocked.

Ahsan who also attended the meeting told the committee that another two accounts had been made in his name on Twitter, on this, the parliamentary body summon senior official of the FIA and the PTA to immediately block the accounts, and prepare a mechanism. The committee also asked the PTA to talk to Twitter management, so that such fake accounts could be shut down immediately.

Senator Dr Shahzad Waseem said that the PTA should talk to Twitter administration to allow a single verified account to an individual.

Senator Muhammad Javed Abbasi said that this is very serious issue as if the fake account in the name of Ahsan who is a senior political leader has been blocked after months then what you think that in how much time a fake account run n the name of an ordinary person will be blocked.

Malik said that we need to replicate the model of Saudi Arabia and the UAE, wherein, all mediums of social media are in the control of government in order to deal with the social media.

The committee offered fatiha for the martyred souls of four army soldiers who were killed during a clash with militants in northwestern Waziristan.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021