The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), the country's telecom regulator, has warned that Pakistan's planned 5G networks face serious cybersecurity risks, including subscriber data theft, real-time location tracking and denial-of-service attacks that can knock services offline.
The caution appears in PTA's latest annual security report. It links the risks to weak security configurations that can leave systems open to unauthorised access and malware. Separately, the PTA chairman has also warned of growing cyber threats facing Pakistanis, including fake calls and one-time password (OTP) scams used to steal account access.
Where the 5G risks sit
According to the findings, weak points stretch across 5G user devices, radio access networks, core network functions, application programming interfaces (APIs — the software links between systems) and cloud-hosted environments.
The 5G core is described as a main target because it handles sensitive subscriber records, session management data and routing information. Edge networks — computing placed closer to users — are said to face higher risk because of their distributed design and containerised workloads, which run software in separate packages that can be harder to lock down if misconfigured.
What PTA wants operators to do
To address these threats, the regulator introduced comprehensive 5G Security Guidelines that stress building protections in from the start rather than fixing gaps after an incident.
Operators are told to use zero-trust architectures (systems that verify every access request), secure boot mechanisms that check devices start only with trusted software, and AI-driven anomaly detection to spot unusual network traffic. Protecting privacy is framed as essential, with mandatory use of advanced identifiers meant to keep permanent subscriber credentials from being intercepted over the air.
Everyday threats beyond the network
Alongside the 5G report, the PTA leadership's public messaging has focused on daily cyber threats to ordinary users, including fake calls and OTP scams. Those schemes typically trick people into sharing codes that unlock banking or account access — a risk that sits beside network-level concerns as Pakistan prepares for next-generation connectivity.
Aasan alfaaz mein
PTA ne kaha hai ke Pakistan ke aanay wale 5G networks par cyber hamlay ka khatra hai. Is mein aap ka data chori hona, location track hona ya service band hona shamil ho sakta hai. Operators ko nai security rules follow karne ke liye kaha gaya hai. Aam users ko fake calls aur OTP scams se bhi hoshiyar rehna chahiye.
