The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has decided not to immediately block cryptocurrency websites in Pakistan, and has sought official comments on the matter from the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication.
According to official sources, the PTA has decided against an earlier request made by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to immediately ban cryptocurrency-related websites in the country.
They also stated that the PTA has requested an official response in this matter from the Ministry of Information and Telecommunications.
According to sources, the FIA identified 1,540 websites and requested that the PTA block them, but the legal precedent for such a move is insufficient to prevent the sites from being blocked.
According to them, all websites can be blocked based on the State Bank of Pakistan’s (SBP) Circular No. 3 of the Banking Policy and Regulation Department (BPRD) dated April 6, 2018. They insisted that until a mechanism is in place, cryptocurrency websites in the country will not be shut down.
According to sources, consultation with relevant agencies has begun regarding the immediate future of digital assets as a genuine store of value.
In the last few months, the world of cryptocurrencies has been rocked by a number of regulatory interventions in Pakistan, as local authorities appear to be intensifying their crackdown on illicit sources of financing.
It is worth noting that the central bank has been conducting internal studies on cryptocurrencies as part of its country’s future monetary strategies.
Despite hopes of a regulatory shift toward adopting digital assets as legal tender on April 12, the situation is now extremely uncertain, making it difficult to predict whether or not the country will see digital assets regularized at all.
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