The official Taliban website has reportedly disappeared from the internet. This site frequently publishes various activities and messages to people inside and outside Afghanistan.
The site went offline suddenly on Friday. It is not yet known what the cause or party is to blame for the disappearance of the site.
The site previously had protection from CloudFlare, a San Francisco-based company that helps websites deliver content and defend against cyberattacks.
But there has been no response from CloudFlare whether they are still protecting the Taliban site. The Taliban website itself has five versions with different languages ranging from Pashto, Dari, Arabic, Urdu to English.
The SITE Intelligence Group which monitors online extremism said many WhatsApp groups used by the Taliban had also been closed on Friday.
WhatsApp, the widely used encrypted chat service in much of the world owned by Facebook, has banned official Taliban accounts from its service.
WhatsApp spokeswoman Alison Bonny declined to comment on whether the company had taken any new action against the Taliban on Friday, but she reiterated the company's previous statement on the matter in general terms.
"We are obligated to comply with US sanctions laws. This includes banning accounts that appear to represent themselves as official Taliban accounts. We are seeking more information from the relevant US authorities given the evolving situation in Afghanistan." he said.
As is known the Taliban have controlled Afghanistan since Sunday (15/8/2021). The Taliban entered Kabul after previous president Ashraf Ghani left the country abroad without resistance from the Afghan military.
This led to a massive evacuation of foreigners considering the unfavorable situation. The US, UK, Germany and Japan have closed embassies and repatriated their citizens.
However, the Taliban is said to be unable to control the country's assets and funds. The reason is that access to most of the country's cash and gold stock is not provided by the Central Bank of Afghanistan.
