Afghanistan’s Fight for Safe Screen Time
Under Taliban surveillance and constant digital distraction, young Afghans are turning social media into a tool for learning, income, and self-reliance—choosing entrepreneurship over escapism
Middle East Uncovered uses pseudonyms and has altered identifying details in this story to protect our sources in Afghanistan.
When Ebrahim scrolls through social media, there’s little content from home. This is deliberate—he changed the settings to bypass Afghanistan’s servers. But it’s not gloomy news stories or regime propaganda he’s avoiding in his feed. It’s the frivolous footage posted by peers that has him worried.
“If I set the algorithm based on Afghanistan, it’s just bad words and bad videos, it depresses me,” said the 36-year-old digital entrepreneur, who launched an online skills platform to fight against the ‘mindset of waste' online.
“In a country where education is outdated and over 2.2 million girls are denied schooling, this platform offers a vital alternative. By redirecting youth from unproductive social media use toward practical digital learning, the project aims to boost income generation through freelancing and remote work,” he added.
For many Afghans, the internet offers opportunities that aren’t available at home. Tech-literate youth seek roles with foreign companies, working remotely to support their families amid an economic crisis that has seen unemployment surge. But while some study and earn online, others while away the days scrolling, posting comments, and making light-hearted videos for social media.
“This is what keeps young people busy. We don’t need this; we need to bring change to Afghanistan,” said Ebrahim.
When the Taliban seized power in 2021, there were concerns they would block the internet entirely, cutting Afghanistan off from the outside world. But in a sharp deviation from their first period in power between 1996 and 2001, the group has pledged to increase 4G mobile internet coverage and connect remote regions in an ongoing expansion of the country’s fibre optic network.
While better connectivity is needed, with internet penetration estimated at just 18.4 percent in Afghanistan, it’s also a tool for surveillance, censorship, and propaganda. Today’s Taliban—internet savvy and active on social media—has harnessed the online space to monitor the population.
Digital expression was one of the first freedoms targeted. In 2022, the Taliban launched an aggressive internet crackdown to block 23 million websites, focusing on media, civil society organizations, and social media platforms, including TikTok and the popular online game PUBG.
A recent report on Digital Infrastructures in Afghanistan described the Taliban’s “love-hate relationship” with the major social media platforms. The group has gone from “completely denouncing the use of social media and the internet to gradually embracing them as useful tools for spreading propaganda,” the study by non-profit International Media Support said.
Last year, the Taliban rolled back plans for a complete block on Facebook, Afghanistan’s most widely used social media platform, opting instead to restrict and monitor the site. “Soon even the online spaces will be too difficult and dangerous for the public at large to manoeuvre unless they do it on the (Taliban’s) terms,” the report said.
The true extent of the Taliban’s current capabilities for utilising data from these sites is unclear, but the regime has a range of tools when it comes to internet control, including targeted shutdowns, restricting access to certain web domains, surveillance technologies, VPN bans, and cyber patrols.
“It’s now extremely risky to post anything political or even slightly criticize the Taliban,” said digital entrepreneur Naveed. “It doesn’t take much, just one anonymous tip or report can get someone’s account flagged.”
Naveed is among a growing number of social entrepreneurs helping other Afghans access education and employment opportunities online. In 2022, he set up a platform that connects tech talent in Afghanistan with jobs in Canada. His goal was to build a digital bridge between the two markets so that people could gain the necessary work experience to land jobs with companies overseas. However, the risk of associating with foreign organizations means many people use fake names, private accounts, and VPNs to access basic content.
“People have been targeted for just giving what they thought was harmless feedback or asking for help or providing guidance,” Naveed said.
The tension between harnessing digital opportunities and the dangers of a misstep online is particularly acute for Afghan women, whose lives have changed under the hardline group. Denied access to education, barred from employment, and shut out of public life, many are seeking ways to study or support their families in secret online.
Ebrahim’s platform translates international courses covering a range of digital skills into Afghanistan’s main languages, Dari and Pashto. It also offers free English classes for women and girls. “This is the only way we can fight against this situation and create positive hope for these girls,” Ebrahim said. “It’s been three and a half years, and still nothing changes; they are worried.”
Still, he is concerned about the bigger picture when he observes Afghan youth online. Many use the internet for escapism rather than learning or employment. “When you share an educational video, it receives a few shares and likes—10 or 20 at most. A video of someone doing a silly dance or ridiculing another person gets thousands of likes, shares, and views. This is a problem on a fundamental level,” he said.
Before the Taliban takeover, Afghanistan was embracing a digitization boom. Tech services were increasing, and an explosion in social media use offered unprecedented opportunities. Now, strategies are needed to “harness the positive aspects of social media while mitigating its negative effects,” a study on The Impact of Social Media in Afghanistan said.
This challenge, mirrored worldwide, is intensified in Afghanistan by the restrictions on day-to-day life, pushing young people to spend more time on social media. “This surge has enhanced communication and fostered national connections, bridging gaps with the outside world and empowering disadvantaged groups, particularly women,” the study, published in the Journal of Multidisciplinary Healthcare, said.
Yet mental health issues and academic challenges are rising as a result of increased social media use among young Afghans. “Immersed in a culture of ubiquitous social validation and comparison, (they) grapple with heightened feelings of inadequacy and insecurity,” the report said.
These struggles echo what social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has documented in other parts of the world. In The Anxious Generation, Haidt describes how the design of social media platforms—optimized for constant engagement and comparison—has contributed to a sharp rise in anxiety, depression, and self-doubt among young people. He calls this the “great rewiring” of adolescence, a shift that, while first observed in wealthier nations, appears to transcend borders. Afghanistan’s experience shows how these harms are not confined to any one culture or economy: the same addictive mechanics that keep teens in the United States scrolling for hours can just as easily ensnare young people in Kabul or Kandahar, even when their online access is limited.
Haidt’s work shows that smartphones and social media tend to pull young people into hours of passive consumption, with measurable harm to mental health and focus.
Jalil, 24, notices the impact when he goes out with friends and sees young people latched to social media, often for five or six hours a day. “When you ask why, they just say, I’m not good, the situation here isn’t good, this is the only place I can find enjoyment,” he said.
In Afghanistan, where opportunities for real-world engagement are already restricted, local entrepreneurs are working to flip that dynamic—designing platforms that channel digital time into learning, creative projects, and paid work. By turning the same devices that fuel distraction into tools for empowerment, they aim to help young Afghans build confidence and self-reliance.
Jalil’s start-up offers a more productive use of time online, with education and employment opportunities that include English courses and a portal connecting freelancers with job listings. “Things are collapsing day by day, and I see youngsters doing nothing, just sitting doing silly things on social media like making fun of themselves to get more views. It saddens me,” Jalil said.
Efforts like Jalil’s directly counter what Haidt describes as the risks of an unstructured, always-on digital environment—where the design of platforms rewards distraction over development. By creating spaces where time online is spent learning skills, building professional networks, and finding paid work, initiatives like his offer the kind of purposeful engagement that Haidt says can help young people avoid the worst mental health impacts of the “great rewiring.”
As younger generations grow increasingly computer-literate, Jalil believes Afghan youth can create their own opportunities online, contributing to the emergence of an entrepreneurial ecosystem that breaks down barriers to business and learning. “I had a mobile phone and an internet connection, and I launched a start-up. Other young Afghans can do these things too,” he said.
Launching a start-up comes with particular challenges. Few digital payment services, including PayPal, operate in Afghanistan, restricting access to international markets and increasing transaction costs. If a company does find a way to navigate online payments, via money mobile operators and digital wallets like HesabPay, the country’s creaking infrastructure creates other hurdles, from delivery issues to minimal start-up support.
These are the problems that entrepreneurs like Kamal are working to address. “There is no lack of potential in Afghanistan, only a lack of services, investors, and support at the political level,” said Kamal, whose company designs mobile applications to find solutions for local challenges.
His latest app aims to fill a gap in the market for centralized e-commerce platforms that make it easier to buy and sell Afghan products abroad. Local artisans struggle to access the international market, where they can charge higher prices for skilled work. Kamal’s app brings everything together in one place. “With digitalization, we can solve lots of stagnant problems,” said Kamal. “By addressing these issues, you can have sustainable businesses in Afghanistan.”
It's a different vision of Afghanistan from the image portrayed by international media—as a repressed state being dragged back to a dark age. But this is not the same country as 25 years ago, when the internet was banned, alongside photography, television, and other media. Now, tech-savvy youth are devising new ways to spread knowledge, devise solutions, and open up opportunities online.
“We have a shared responsibility to help Afghan people be a part of the future,” said Kamal. His hope, like many of his enterprising peers, is that a new generation of digitally literate Afghans will tackle their country’s problems, one click at a time.
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