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Taliban Leader Bans Wi-Fi In an Afghan Province To 'Prevent Immorality' (apnews.com) 153

Posted by BeauHD from the fiber-optics-of-evil dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Associated Press: The Taliban leader banned fibre optic internet in an Afghan province to "prevent immorality," a spokesman for the administration said Tuesday. It's the first time a ban of this kind has been imposed since the Taliban seized power in August 2021, and leaves government offices, the private sector, public institutions, and homes in northern Balkh province without Wi-Fi internet. Mobile internet remains functional, however.

Haji Attaullah Zaid, a provincial government spokesman, said there was no longer cable internet access in Balkh by order of a "complete ban" from the leader Hibatullah Akhundzada. "This measure was taken to prevent immorality, and an alternative will be built within the country for necessities," Zaid told The Associated Press. He gave no further information, including why Balkh was chosen for the ban or if the shutdown would spread to other provinces.
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Taliban Leader Bans Wi-Fi In an Afghan Province To 'Prevent Immorality' More

Taliban Leader Bans Wi-Fi In an Afghan Province To 'Prevent Immorality'

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  • Can't stop the signal, Mal... (Score:3)

    by TWX ( 665546 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @06:06PM (#65664276)

    Yes, they could try to locate everyone that manages to use banned technology like this, but as commodity-level technology designed to be used by even unskilled individuals, they're not going to be able to stop people from using technology. All they'll be able to do is to punish them after finding them.

    • Re:Can't stop the signal, Mal... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @06:33PM (#65664324)

      Yes, they could try to locate everyone that manages to use banned technology like this, but as commodity-level technology designed to be used by even unskilled individuals, they're not going to be able to stop people from using technology. All they'll be able to do is to punish them after finding them.

      Yup, 'cause the Taliban is known for giving up easily and being lenient to people breaking morality decrees. /s

    • Re:Can't stop the signal, Mal... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by MacMann ( 7518492 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @06:57PM (#65664378)

      If I'm reading the fine article correctly this isn't just about WiFi. They had a ban on cable internet in place already. A ban on fiber internet is being put in place, likely more of closing a loophole than anything really new as people could argue that fiber is not cable. The WiFi ban is likely also closing a loophole as people were signing up for WiFi service to their homes, using WiFi at cafes, or such so as to get faster internet than they could have with cellular. I'd expect the next step to restricting communications is somehow getting cellular internet slowed or restricted somehow. Then people might be using 14.4 bps cellular modems for internet, that way they can LAN party like its 1999.

      Anyone else have a Motorola Timeport with the serial interface cable for mobile internet access? I believe I got rid of mine in 2006. Someone must still be making some kind of equivalent yet.

      With no WiFi there's no cheap and easy way to leach off what little internet access is allowed for government and approved businesses. With the remaining access to the internet by the general public restricted to mobile phones there's a single point of access, and this is controlled to where they can shut it down quickly. The justification for shutting off cellular phone access is that the system has been used to trigger explosives directly.

      Thinking of remote triggering of explosives I'm reminded of reading something about a deputy sheriff coming to some kind of mine or demolition site to register some complaint. There were big *HUGE* signs that any RF gear was restricted inside the area. The deputy demanded the work stop until he saw some paperwork. The foreman showed the papers, the deputy went to his cruiser, keyed up the mic on his radio to verify the papers where legit, and... the explosives went off. It's not like this was any kind of special radio, likely 50 watt UHF business band radio that produced just enough RF noise to set off the primers on the explosives. It was a good thing that the area was cleared before this yahoo cop violated a very basic safety protocol. If there's an intention to set off explosives from a distance then they can use mobile radios instead. This is off the shelf stuff, and can allow for communication range over miles. To avoid random triggering like in the example I gave they can put in a bit more work on the filters and such than that used for demolition work.

      Tracking down WiFi to locate and punish those violating the restrictions is likely trivial enough to keep people from trying it, especially if the punishment is severe. What might be difficult to trace is satellite internet. I'm not sure what kind of power, frequencies, and such that satellite internet uses. With the ability to focus and direct the RF up to satellites I'm guessing that this could be difficult to track, at least from the ground. The connection to any devices would have to be by wires, of course, or it's just back to having easily located WiFi again.

    • It doesn't take very many brutal, public executions to get people to stop.

    • Maybe dude, but your talking a country with extremely low technical literacy and a totalarian government.

      The regional govenors making these decisions might be ignorant-ass country bumpkins, but they've got a militia behind them thats more than skilled at pulling off some intensely barbaric shit if provoked.

      No ones going up against that for reddit access.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Bert64 ( 520050 )

      Well since the banned technology is wired, it won't be very difficult to trace the wires...
      Also not very difficult to cut them.

  • You can't ban WiFi! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by SmaryJerry ( 2759091 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @06:17PM (#65664296)
    Might as well ban women altogether from public, set up patrols of males who round up women who go out alone and jail them, stop them from going to school, don't let women hold jobs without male approval, and in the rare moments they are allowed in public cover them up completely ......... wait..... oh.
  • Why stop at WiFi?

  • So, if WiFi causes immorality (no, not immortality, stupid autocorrect)
    AND
    Musk runs the world's largest space-based wireless internet network

    Does that make him the world's most immoral man?

    • So, if WiFi causes immorality (no, not immortality, stupid autocorrect)
      AND
      Musk runs the world's largest space-based wireless internet network

      Does that make him the world's most immoral man?

      No, it's just a coincidence that he's the world's most immoral man.

      • No, it's just a coincidence that he's the world's most immoral man.

        More immoral than the Taliban? I mean I know he and his DOGE goons went around shutting down parts of the US government but they did it by firing people, not shooting and beheading them.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by narcc ( 412956 )

          Elmo just didn't stick around long enough to get the chance. The shooting, kidnapping, and torturing has already started, the beheadings probably aren't too far behind. Poor fellow... he had his chainsaw ready and everything...

          Still, history will not be kind to him.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Bert64 ( 520050 )

          The taliban don't consider themselves to be immoral. In fact quite the opposite, they consider themselves to be the moral police enforcing what they believe to be the words of Allah.

          In fact, one of the key reasons the taliban were founded was to put a stop to the practice of raping young boys, something which was extremely common in afghanistan at the time:
          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

          Whatever you might feel about the other policies of the taliban, im sure most people would be in full agreement with the

          • If we judged morality based on how moral people feel they are then the least moral person would probably be someone like Mother Theresa because their standards are so high that they never feel that they meet them while people like the Taliban, Stalin and Hitler would be highly "moral" because they followed their own internal twisted morality without regard to anything else leading to what the rest of us regard as some of the most immoral atrocities ever commited.
    • No, silly. He's the worst for other reasons. Inciting violence at rallies, for instance.
  • Block the Internet? That blocks access to PornHub. You have to be very brave or very stupid to invite the backlash for that decision.
  • to ban immortality at first.. *giggles*. Seems like the same outcome in either case.
  • wifi != fiber wtf over

  • ...but WiFi ain't one.

  • Hide your wi-fi.

  • Have to wonder about "religious" "leaders" (Score:4, Insightful)

    by buss_error ( 142273 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @07:17PM (#65664414) Homepage Journal

    Even the most casual study of divinity will show that almost all religions consider simply thinking of some things is a "sin". Almost all religions grant mankind free will, and the supreme being (call them what you may) "allows" for the "choice of sin".

    So, by prohibiting "sin", they are, in effect, declaring themselves to be smarter than their Deity, who, in The Wisdom of that Deity, granted the ability to "sin".
    I'm pretty sure that's not how that works.

    • So, by prohibiting "sin", they are, in effect, declaring themselves to be smarter than their Deity, who, in The Wisdom of that Deity, granted the ability to "sin".

      Saving people from themselves is a very, very common trope in religious adherence. In Christianity, there's the metaphor of a shepherd watching over his flock - implying that if left to their own devices, the sheep would get themselves into trouble or fall prey to predators. The sheep still have free will, but have to be prevented from allowing that free will to lead them astray from the flock.

      Religion wouldn't have lasted as long as it did if they didn't come up with some explanation for nearly any hole

      • Religion wouldn't have lasted as long as it did if they didn't come up with some explanation for nearly any hole you tried to poke in their beliefs.

        And there's a reason the Inquisition burned books. Oddly, Ireland is about the only place where those that would burn the books were themselves burned in the dark ages. It's something Seneca wrote about before the dark ages and before the inquisition, off hand, can't recall the exact wording, but the conclusion is that some have a need to put others in charge of their lives so that they don't have to take responsibility for themselves and their outcomes. Sort of like the conservative meme that being poor is

    • That's why religion should be blasted out of existence as it's nothing more then a way to control people, that's why it was invented.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Bert64 ( 520050 )

        Exactly this. It's the "nuclear deterrent" of ancient kings.
        Convince the people that you have an all powerful weapon on your side, so that any attempt to oppose your rule would result in a certain horrible fate for them.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mjwx ( 966435 )

      Even the most casual study of divinity will show that almost all religions consider simply thinking of some things is a "sin". Almost all religions grant mankind free will, and the supreme being (call them what you may) "allows" for the "choice of sin".

      So, by prohibiting "sin", they are, in effect, declaring themselves to be smarter than their Deity, who, in The Wisdom of that Deity, granted the ability to "sin".
      I'm pretty sure that's not how that works.

      This is how religious control works,

      1. Declare that something normal and natural is a "sin".
      2. Everyone sins.
      3. The get-out from your sin is to be forgiven by religious authorities. Of course only the deity can forgive sin but the deity has representatives on earth that is totally not doing this for their own benefit and power.
      4. Once forgiven, people go out and commit more sin.
      5. Rinse and repeat.

      Remember that it won't take much for this state of affairs to come to western nations. The US was

  • I suspect folks in Balkh were using the internet to shake things up.

  • Probably not the case here... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Z80a ( 971949 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @07:26PM (#65664422)

    But the last time a government banned the internet, it got removed and replaced by someone that won a discord poll.

  • Balkh province (Score:5, Informative)

    by backslashdot ( 95548 ) on Tuesday September 16, 2025 @07:59PM (#65664504)

    Damn, you guys are morons. Even the Taliban knows banning WiFi has NOTHING to do with immorality or Wi-Fi .. people in Balkh don't like the Taliban. It was, and is, a Northern Alliance stronghold (now called National Resistance Front - NRF ), they are annoying the heck out of the Taliban. Reference: https://www.afintl.com/en/2025... [afintl.com] https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] https://www.afintl.com/en/2025... [afintl.com] https://moderndiplomacy.eu/202... [moderndiplomacy.eu]. This ban will make things a lot worse for the Taliban there, not better. The reason for the WiFi ban is because the Taliban thinks the attacks on them were coordinated through Wi-Fi and that the NRF use it to communicate.

  • Whew! (Score:2)

    by PPH ( 736903 )

    Thought he was going to ban wifey for a moment.

  • ...the 'leader' still has his 'dancing boys'?

  • The government (controlled by the Mullahs or whatever) basically want the population living a Stone Age existence compared to the rest of the world. Poor, ignorant, and on the verge of starving will keep the peons in line.

    I'm sure they'd also like to tattoo everyone at birth, or at least the women (so they'd know who they 'belonged' to).

    I forget who said it, but the truth is that some cultures are better than others.

  • Sad (Score:2)

    by vbdasc ( 146051 )

    While generally IDGAF about Afghanistan (sorry if I'm looking bigoted) I feel sad looking at the state of Slashdot editing. Confusing Wi-fi with cable internet is something I'd expect from the Cosmopolitan, but here? SMH.

  • I assume the CIA or similar is looking into parachuting nudie magazines into the territory.

  • Look at all the porn age verification laws that are being passed. They know they can't directly pass bans, so this is what they are doing for now. Ohio goes into effect in a two weeks. Michigan is trying to pass one. Several other states already have.
  • Don't want the people to have internet, but you can bet they have it !
  • There's no way an article that doesn't get the technical semantics remotely right would make it past CmdrTaco.
  • Taliban tech A: the internet's down in Bumfuckistan.
    Taliban tech B: go fix it
    Taliban tech A: I have no idea how, I tried restarting the computer and it didn't do anything
    Taliban tech B: restart the router.
    Taliban tech A: I tried, but it was smoking and wouldn't turn back on.
    Taliban tech B: replace the router
    Taliban tech A: I can , but I have no idea how to program it.
    Taliban tech B: Manager, we can't fix it.
    Taliban Manager: Shit. Lets just tell everyone the internet is immoral so we don't have to fix it.
    Tal

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