EGYPT’S top media regulator tightened restrictions on social, online and traditional media on Monday night, allowing the Western-backed autocratic government to block websites and social media accounts if they are deemed a national security threat.

The action represents the latest attempt by President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi’s government to suppress dissent. In recent years, Egypt has launched an unprecedented crackdown on reporters and the media, imprisoning dozens and occasionally expelling some foreign journalists.

The new regulations allow the Supreme Media Regulatory Council to block websites and accounts for “fake news” and to impose stiff penalties of up to 250,000 Egyptian pounds (£10,850), all without having to obtain a court order.

Prominent Egyptian journalists have called the measures unconstitutional, saying they grant far-reaching powers to authorities to censor the media in violation of basic press freedoms.

Journalists’ union board member Mohamed Abdel-Hafiz said the government was threatening to punish journalists for “vaguely defined national security violations, as well as vaguely defined political, social or religious norms.”