TOPSHOT - A Taliban flag flutters near telecom equipment installed over a rooftop providing internet services overlooking Hazrat-e-Ali Shrine, or Blue Mosque, in Mazar-i-Sharif on September 16, 2025, as the Taliban administration banned fibre-optic internet in Balkh province.
ATIF ARYAN/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Afghanistan is in the midst of a communications blackout, just weeks after Taliban authorities began severing fiber optic connections in multiple provinces, in what appears to be the Islamist regime's latest crackdown.

"Afghanistan is now in the midst of a total internet blackout as Taliban authorities move to implement morality measures, with multiple networks disconnected through the morning in a stepwise manner; telephone services are currently also impacted," the cybersecurity and internet governance watchdog Netblocks said Monday in a post on X.

Afghanistan's Taliban authorities began to restrict internet service earlier this month, shutting down high-speed connections in several regions across the country, the French news agency AFP reported Monday. CBS News has independently verified that internet links have now been cut nationwide.

The Taliban's leadership has not publicly commented on the blackout, but on Friday, Haji Zahid, a local Taliban spokesperson in the northern province of Balkh, said in a post on X that the ban had been ordered by the group's supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, "to prevent immoral activities."

Afghan television channel TOLO said Monday that its broadcast was disrupted by the communications blackout. TOLO News also reported that mobile phone internet services had been shut down. It cited sources within the Taliban as indicating mobile services could soon be restored, but with a lower-capacity 2G signal.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said Tuesday that the ban risked harming the Afghan people, threatening economic stability and exacerbating the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the country. It called on the Taliban to immediately restore the internet.

"Such a ban has immediate and far-reaching consequences, including severely impacting the functioning of critical banking and financial systems, further increasing the isolation of women and girls, limiting access to emergency services and medical care, disrupting the aviation sector, and limiting access to remittances for dependent families. The current blackout also constitutes a further restriction on access to information and freedom of expression in Afghanistan," the mission said in a statement.

The U.S. and most other Western nations have refused to recognize the Taliban as Afghanistan's legitimate government since it retook control of the country in 2021, following the chaotic U.S. military withdrawal from the country.

The country's Taliban rulers have dramatically rolled back the rights of women and girls, detained journalists, and cracked down on public dissent since retaking power.

The country faces one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, according to Human Rights Watch, exacerbated by donor governments' aid cuts and the return of 1.9 million refugees expelled from Iran and Pakistan. Afghanistan is also still recovering from a devastating earthquake that killed nearly 3,000 people earlier this month.

Torek Farhadi, a former senior advisor to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, told CBS News on Monday that the lack of internet access would be devastating for ordinary people in Afghanistan.

"For Afghanistan's youth, it is definitely another costly fallback if it continues. It closes the door on online education, it severely handicaps business owners who communicate with clients," Farhadi said. "It is a deliberate decision to lead society to a blind spot."

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