ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly Standing Committee on Information Technology (IT) has directed the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and the Ministry of IT to coordinate with each other on fake social media accounts.

Committee chair MNA Ali Khan Jadoon said that people are suffering due to thelack of coordination between the ministry and the agency.

He said social media is popular and people rely on it, `so there is need to give attention to it and ensure people will not suffer because of it.

Mr Jadoon said that he had contacted the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) about the fake accounts issue, but found that the authority was helpless.

Committee members said that fake social media accounts need to be looked into, because they can not only become a matter of embarrassment but are also used for misreporting and fraud.

The committee has beenpushing in its last several meetings for various stakeholders to address this matter because committee members and other parliamentarians have been affected by fake social media accounts.

At a meeting last month, the FIA told the IT committee that it has received around 30,000 complaints from citizens of alleged cybercrimes and misuse of social media in 30 months.

FIA Cyber Crime Wing Director Afzal Mehmood Butt told the committee: `As many as 15,433 complaints related to misuse of Facebook have been lodged, 6,067 cases have been registered over issues related to Twitter and over 3,000 people have contacted us as they suffered through WhatsApp.

MNA Naz Baloch from the PTI had said at the last committee meeting that there were many fake social media accounts set up in her name.

She said some of these have tens of thousands of followers, adding that although she has lodged a complaint no one has ever approachedher aboutthe issue.