Do not go to Africa for a walk: how are things going with Internet censorship on the Black Continent

The past few years have been marked not only by the rapid development of Internet technologies and the penetration of the Internet in those regions of the world where it’s hard even with regular mobile communications. Internet censorship tools were developed and adopted by officials, including banning sites and services, viewing messages from users of email and chat services, DPI filtering of packages, and much more.

Journalists of well-known and not-so-media outlets write about all this in relation to China, North Korea, Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, etc. Internet censorship has even penetrated Africa. Today we’ll talk about how things are on the Black Continent.

A little about the prices and availability of the Internet in Africa

More recently, the Internet in Africa was a curiosity, which was freely used only by the inhabitants of the richest states of the continent - South Africa, Tunisia, Egypt. Since 2013, several submarine Internet routes have been brought to Africa, so access to the network has become a little better.
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Africa and Internet Highways in 2019 ( source )

But changes are being introduced slowly, and prices are dropping even more slowly. In a number of African countries, both cable Internet and mobile connection remain very expensive. In Namibia and Burkina Faso, for example, an individual monthly unlimited connection until recently cost as much as would be enough for a whole house, or even a small village in the CIS.



As of 2018, Africa remained the most expensive region in terms of the price of mobile Internet. So, in Equatorial Guinea, Zimbabwe and Swaziland - the three most expensive countries - one gigabyte of mobile data costs more than $ 20 .


Worst of all, sub-Saharan Africa. Here are 31 countries, and in 16 states the most expensive Internet in the world.

Nevertheless, the situation is gradually changing for the better - there are more and more Internet backbones, telecom operators, which means that prices are dropping. But with the increase in Internet penetration, negative effects also appear - for example, Internet censorship. When there are few Internet users, and most of them belong to local political and business elites, censorship is not needed. But when tens and hundreds of thousands of ordinary people connect to the network, the governments of several countries begin to think about the need to filter the flow of information on these your Internet.

Internet censorship in various countries in Africa

Censorship, internet censorship is everywhere

In Africa, as in the rest of the world, laws are gradually being adopted that regulate the rules of working with the Internet, including the imposition of penalties for cybercrime. Some African states have separate cybersecurity laws; relevant bills are proposed in other countries. So far, Somalia, Sierra Leone, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea and Guinea-Bissau are behind.

But in other countries, Internet censorship works at its full potential.

Tanzania

It all started in 2017, during a round table with representatives of China and Tanzania. The Deputy Minister of Communications and Communications of Tanzania praised China for the fact that the regulators of this country have replaced international Internet platforms with their own services. Tanzania called them "home safe and popular." Then the deputy minister complained that there was no such practice in his country, but he was not upset for long.

Already in March 2018, the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority requested bloggers and operators of online television and online radio channels to register. At the time of registration, they were required to pay a fee of approximately $ 930, having received in exchange a license to conduct relevant activities for a period of three years.



In the future, the regulator began to require the owners of sites and forums to remove “oppositional” content. Then specialized forum user authentication systems were introduced. The owners of Internet cafes (and establishments of this kind are very popular in the country) were required to keep their customers' activity logs for about a year.

Violation of the rules is punishable by a prison term of up to one year, as well as a fine of several thousand US dollars. After the new laws were put into operation, the popular online media were closed, the owners of which did not want to fall into disgrace of law enforcement agencies.

Uganda

For residents of this country, changes in the use of Internet networks have become noticeable since the summer of 2018. Then the government introduced a special tax on connecting to more than 60 services. These include WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook, Skype. I had to pay about 50 cents a day, which is a substantial amount for the vast majority of the country's inhabitants. In addition, it was necessary to pay for mobile Internet. The total amount of direct and indirect costs amounted to about half of the monthly income of a citizen.

The number of Internet users decreased, less money began to flow into the local economy. The problem was also that local residents used mobile services for settlements with each other. After the introduction of the tax, some users completely stopped using the Internet, and some began to connect via VPN in order to remain anonymous and not pay the same tax.

Ethiopia

For a long time, strict Internet censorship was in effect here. Different manifestations of dissent were fought using the 2009 anti-terrorism law. True, the country's new prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, somewhat reduced the degree of censorship.


This building houses the Internet provider Ethio Telecom - the only provider that, in addition, is owned by the state.

Nevertheless, the practice of disconnecting the Internet in case of unrest among citizens is popular here. So, this year there was no Internet for a week, after which a group of lawyers filed a lawsuit against the country's only Internet provider. There was no Internet in mid-June, and problems in the regions are still being observed. The country's authorities decided to disable access to the network during the national graduation exams.

Since 2015, Ethiopian residents have been faced with a massive shutdown of the Internet several times. Actually, if there is only one Internet provider in the country, then this is not difficult.

Kenya

The government of this country is actively regulating the Internet. Last year, a law was introduced according to which distributors of “false information” (a fuzzy term that can be interpreted as anything) received a fine of $ 50 thousand, plus a possible imprisonment of up to two years.

In Kenya, the life of video bloggers is difficult - you need to register in this capacity, plus pay for each video invested in the Internet and for every day of filming. It turns out that the production cost of even an amateur video is so high that few people want to do it. But if you do not pay, you can get a large fine and imprisonment for up to 5 years .

It also prohibits certain Internet resources that are blacklisted.

Burundi

This state has a very low level of internetization, but a high level of Internet censorship. The government does not hesitate to turn off network access for users throughout the country when it seems to him that something is going wrong. For example, in 2015, almost all major international social networks and instant messengers were disconnected here. In addition, blocked Internet resources and services. Last year, a new bill amended the Law on Communications , enabling law enforcement agencies to intercept electronic messages and seize information from individuals and companies by decision of the prosecutor's office. Some companies transfer their resources to other domain zones, and the media offer readers to use a VPN.

South Africa, Egypt, Morocco, Rwanda

In these countries with the Internet, almost everything is fine. Cases of censorship are sporadic, this tool is used mainly against resources controlled by terrorists, as well as sites that do not speak very respectfully about the authorities. But there are no special penalties for “disrespect”, there are no different taxes for connecting to social networks or instant messengers. True, from time to time in Morocco some proxy services block .

A few years ago, in Rwanda, a number of cybersecurity laws were adopted that are aimed at protecting the personal data of network users, as well as state secrets and banking data from cybercriminal attacks. The authorities do not particularly abuse these laws. But cybercriminals in the country are now caught and punished.

As for other African countries, in some countries the level of Internet access is so low that it makes no sense to talk about any censorship - in such states, for example, Burkina Faso, the network is distributed by “pocket” Internet providers, to which only elite representatives connect.

As for countries where the level of Internet access is relatively high, but censorship is also actively developing, according to experts, local residents are actively using various tools to bypass locks, such as VPN services. In this, Africa is no different from all other regions.

Have you had any experience using the internet in Africa?