Dhaka: Government will not make any list of people who are watching pornography websites, said the State Minister for Posts and Telecommunications Tarana Halim on her Facebook post on Tuesday morning.

The minister, denying a buzz that government will prepare a list to expose the porn site viewers, said her ministry is obligated to keep the privacy of people’s personal information. 

However, Tarana Halim said a technical committee, formed by the posts and telecommunications division (PTD), is working to find out ways to block the porn sites generated both locally and internationally.

She denied ever mentioning about the list of porn viewers. ‘It’s not possible technically to identify the porn website viewers.’

‘It’s really disappointing that the rumour spread in social media without any mediating, said the minister.

She said, ‘People have their freedom of expression. They also have the right to pointing out our mistakes. But we don’t have the right to offense someone without knowing the fact.’

‘The truth is we formed a committee to block the pornographic websites that are being generated inside the country. The committee is working and would submit list of porn sites and technical proposal within 15 days from forming of the committee. ISP and IIG will take steps to block the local porn sites. We didn’t get the report yet,’ said the minister.

She said, ‘We couldn’t block all the contents totally as some sites are generated internationally or through YouTube. However, if we can block seventy per cent of these sites, people will be benefited.’

Earlier on Monday afternoon, Tarana Halim said the Internet Service providers must have to block the porn sites that are being generated inside the country.

‘But, for the international site, we’ve put concentration to develop a mechanism that would expose the people to us who are signing in to those sites,’ she said, adding, ‘So, people would refrain from logging in to the porn site fearing to be exposed.’

On 28 November, the posts and telecommunications division (PTD) formed a committee to prepare a database of the websites spreading ‘pornography’ and ‘objectionable contents’ in cyber space.

The committee, headed by a director general of Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), is assigned to prepare a set of recommendation to thwart pornography and any ill motive in the cyber space.

According to Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), now the country has over 6.68 crore internet users, of which 6.30 crore users browse through mobile phone.