Indonesia has banned the blogging site Tumblr over the presence of pornographic content.
The platform was one of 477 sites that were blocked by authorities in a crackdown over the distribution of porn on the Web, reported the BBC.
The move was made without any consultation or prior warning with the company, which is owned by Yahoo (YHOO).
“We must ban the site first, and tell them later,” Azhar Hasyim, e-business director at Indonesia’s Information Ministry, told the BBC.
Indonesia is the world’s largest Muslim country, with around 200 million Muslims making up more than 90% of its population. It has been held up by dignitaries such as British Prime Minister David Cameron as a moderate Islamic government, with a 2012 report by Freedom House designating the country with a “Free” status over its civil liberties.
In recent years, however, the country has especially targeted the Internet and apps that display what it deems to be questionable content. Last week, popular messaging app Line was issued an order to remove emojis depicting any LGBT relationships. In 2014, Vimeo, Reddit and imgur were among some sites that were blocked over the presence of any vulgar content in certain parts of these sites.
Earlier this year, Indonesia’s largest Internet provider Telkom blocked Netflix (NFLX) over its perceived lack of cooperation over how to filter out any “adult content,” said the company’s director of consumers Dian Rachmawan.
