By 5 p.m. on September 29th, Afghanistan became a black box. Flights were canceled. Banks closed. Business slowed. Thousands of women and girls reliant on online education wondered what their alternatives might be. The Taliban, like the rest of the country, was silent. Forty-eight hours later, as Afghans welcomed the Internet’s return, many of them wondered why their country had gone dark.
“One of the big reasons that the Internet was cut off was those online lessons,” said Abdul Farid Salangi, founder of Woman Online University. After the Taliban took over Afghanistan in 2021, the regime barred women from secondary school and college. Many turned to online classes to continue their education. For these students, the Internet is a singular link to the outside world. As rumors swirled of an imminent Internet shutdown, female students worried about losing the opportunity to study. “Most of them said their option would be suicide,” said Salangi, founder of Woman Online University.
On October 1st, Afghans took to the streets to celebrate the return of the Internet. People connected to relatives abroad. Media coverage resumed. Salangi’s students reconnected to classes, their relief mixed with fear. “I am scared right now. It can happen again and again. I have no trust in the government,” said a student at Woman Online University, who requested anonymity to protect her safety. To her and many of her classmates, the Internet shutdown represented a direct attack on female education.
In the two weeks leading up to the nationwide shutdown, disruptions crept across the country. At first, Taliban leaders were clear about their motives for cutting off connection. On September 16th, the Taliban cut off fiber-optic cable in the northern Balkh province “for the purpose of preventing immoral acts,” a spokesperson said on X. Two days later, the shutdown spread to five more provinces in the north and east. Residents of the capital doubted the shutdown would reach them. Once it did, they worried it would never lift. At this point, the Taliban, like the rest of the country, was silent.
“The speculation is that this is not just about morality. This is about control,” said Lyse Doucet, chief international correspondent for the BBC, on that publication’s Newshour. The Taliban denied responsibility in the nationwide shutdown, blaming tired fiber-optic cables in need of replacement.
The earlier disruptions left mobile internet, an expensive and patchy alternative to fiber-optic, (Wi-Fi) intact. But streaming packages exceed the budgets of most Afghans, a vast majority of whom live in poverty, according to a 2023 report by the UNDP. Cheap alternatives for getting online sustain essential services in the country. But recently, the Taliban has restricted telecommunications, citing concerns about vice. Taliban leaders have expressed concern about flirting online and watching pornography. Critics see this as a veil for the regime’s campaign to silence dissent.
In the future, the Taliban may develop techniques to block specific types of media from entering Afghanistan’s online world, said Amanda Meng, an analyst at IODA, an Internet connectivity tracker. Today, the country lacks the hardware required for this level of censorship.
Still, the Taliban is censoring citizens in overt ways. In late August, the Taliban ordered universities to stop assigning books by women. Last year, women were banned from the only two courses of study still available to them at the time—midwifery and nursing. On Saturday, the Taliban banned cellphones on university campuses. Meanwhile, journalists are at risk. A joint report by the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan and the UN Human Rights Office documented over 300 human rights violations against media professionals from August 2021 to September 2024. Last year, a journalist told DW that the Taliban prevents coverage of crime and violence.
Not all Talibs endorse such restrictions. The Internet shutdown and its aftermath exposed ideological differences between the traditional faction in Kandahar, led by Taliban leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, and more progressive officials. On October 1st, the Taliban’s chief minister and minister of telecommunications ordered the Internet’s restoration. Akhundzada endorses the shutdown. Younger Talibs understand how a shutdown of such magnitude could backfire.
“There are many in the Taliban who say, we simply have to be part of the modern world. We want Afghanistan to develop. Could this be a moment of reckoning?” said Lyse Doucet, chief international correspondent for the BBC on that publication’s Newshour podcast. The vast majority of Talibs, she said, oppose the regime’s hardline edicts. Orders out of Kandahar, where the most traditional faction resides, eclipse the regime’s more moderate crop.
In recent months, top officials have faced consequences for opposing Akhundzada, the hardline leader, and his restrictions on women. On January 20th, senior Taliban official Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai criticized bans on female education in his speech at a graduation ceremony in the Khost province. “We are being unjust to 20 million people,” he said. Soon after, Akhundzada ordered Stanikzai’s arrest and exile. The senior official left for the UAE, citing health concerns to local media. In December, a suicide bomber killed the Taliban’s refugee Minister Khalil Haqqani, spurring rumors that a rival Taliban official ordered the assassination.
The Taliban’s mounting restrictions on freedom have spurred international outrage. On Monday, the UN Rights Council created an Afghanistan Accountability Body. The EU-led resolution passed with consensus, signaling a moment of unity against the Taliban’s violations of human rights. There is a growing recognition of “gender apartheid,” the systematic suppression of women’s rights, said Kimmy Coseteng, from Right to Learn Afghanistan, a Canadian group.
At the same time, some doubt the power of international pressure to sway the Taliban. Doucet said on the BBC that criticism from the outside can even compel the Taliban to double down on restrictions. But the recent Internet shutdown may have exacerbated internal divisions that may threaten the regime’s stability. Change, Doucet said, “has to come from within the Taliban.”
