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Papua New Guinea Bans Facebook

Papua New Guinea is banning Facebook to check compatibility with new cyber crime laws

The people of Papua New Guinea will get a month-long break from social media after government plans to shut down Facebook.

The Communications Minister of Papua New Guinea Sam Basil have said that the government will block access to Facebook for an entire month to evaluate to platform’s pros and cons.

“The time will allow information to be collected to identify users that hide behind fake accounts, users that upload pornographic images, users that post false and misleading information on Facebook to be filtered and removed,” Mr Basil told media.

“This will allow genuine people with real identities to use the social network responsibly.”

This would not be the first time a country blocks Facebook. China, Iran and North Korea have all banned access to the social media platform.

However, the country will not follow in their footsteps, and will only ban the website over a fixed time frame.

The country enforced a Cyber Crime Act in 2016, which they now need to test Facebook for. If Facebook’s happens to be incompatible with the country’s cyber crime laws, it could be banned forever.

“We cannot allow the abuse of Facebook to continue in the country,” Mr Basil said.

“If there need be then we can gather our local applications developers to create a site that is more conducive for Papua New Guineans to communicate within the country and abroad as well,” he added.

No dates for the ban have yet been announced.

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