The Bangladesh Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (BTRC) took a dramatic step on Monday, blocking over 2200 gambling websites as well as over 15,000 adult websites. The crackdown also included the shutting down of two popular video sharing apps for smartphones – Tik Tok and Bigo.

Last Thursday, it was announced that 176 such gambling websites had been blocked in Bangladesh. There were 1279 pornographic websites blocked within the country as well, however, that number grew exponentially over the weekend.

Purity and retaliation

According to a post published on Facebook by Telecommunications and Information Technology Minister Mustafa Jabbar, the move was created to provide a safer space on the Internet that was free of “indecent content.” The minister explained that the use of the Internet was supposed to be for the “benefit” of young people, and that adult and gambling websites were found to be in violation.