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08Oct

Freedom on the Net 2013: An African Review

Author admin Posted on

The increasing use of the Internet worldwide has continued to see governments put caveats on its openness and the range of freedoms users enjoy online. According to the 2013 Freedom on the Net report, in the period May 2012–April 2013, the global number of censored websites has increased, while internet users in various countries have been arrested, tortured, and killed over the information they posted online.
In Sub Saharan Africa, Freedom House found that both physical and technical mechanisms of filtering, monitoring or otherwise obstructing free speech online have been employed by states concerned with the power of internet-based technologies.
“All 10 of the African countries examined in this report have stepped up their online monitoring efforts in the past year, either by obtaining new technical capabilities or by expanding the government’s legal authority,” says the report which was published by Freedom House on October 3, 2013. Last year, Ethiopia was the only country in the region found to implement nationwide internet filtering.
In its study, Freedom House covered developments in internet freedom in 60 countries around the world.  Based on an examination of obstacles to access, limits to content, and violation of user rights on the internet, countries were scored as ‘Free’, ‘Partly Free’ or ‘Not Free’.
Table 1: Summary of Global Freedom on the Net Rankings (Source: by author based on Freedom on the Net 2013 report)

Continent Free Not Free Partly Free Total
Asia 2 8 4 14
Eurasia 3 5 2 10
Australia, EU, Iceland and the United States 9     9
Latin America 1 4 1 6
Middle East and North Africa   5 6 11
Sub-Saharan Africa 2 6 2 10
Total 17 28 15 60

Free
South Africa and Kenya were the two countries reported as Free. In Kenya, mention was made of the communications regulatory authority issuing guidelines to internet service providers not to allow services to be used to spread hate speech. Service providers were also reportedly required to install internet traffic monitoring equipment.
In South Africa, the proposed Protection of State Information bill which criminalises reporting on classified state information and accessing leaked information online would violate user rights if passed into law. Another legislation, the General Intelligence Laws Amendment 2013, which gives authorities the power to intercept bulk communications known as “foreign signals intelligence” was passed in July 2013. The partially state-owned Telkom network was also said to have installed servers to harvest data and user information. The extent to which this spyware has been deployed in the country was unknown.
Partly Free
Freedom house ranked Malawi, Nigeria, Angola, Uganda, Rwanda and Zimbabwe as ‘Partly Free’. A draft Interception of Communications law in Nigeria was criticised for potentially infringing on user’s right to privacy. There were also reports that the Nigerian government had awarded a contract to an Israeli based company to monitor internet communications. A privately owned ISP was said to have installed surveillance malware. It is unclear if the installation was at the bidding of the state.
Suspicions of online government surveillance in Uganda increased in part due to officials publically expressing “the need” for policing Internet mediums. A new communications law, the Uganda Communications Act, passed in September 2012 created a regulatory authority with sweeping powers to oversee electronic, print and broadcast media. The body’s independence has been called into question. As a sim card (including mobile internet) registration exercises drew to a close, there were privacy concerns due to the country’s lack of data protection legislation. The country already has lawful interception of communications regulations.
There were no reports of internet content being blocked or filtered in Zimbabwe. However, ruling party officials were said to have publicly expressed the desire to increase control over ICTs, particularly in the lead-up to the July 2013 general elections. Zimbabwe was also said to be seeking foreign support for surveillance in Iran. “Personnel from the Zimbabwean armed forces and the Central Intelligence Organisation have been undergoing intensive cyber training in technological warfare techniques, counter-intelligence and methods of suppressing popular revolts among others, every six months,” says the report.
Egypt was also reported to be seeking surveillance assistance from Iran. Activists and social media users were also targeted by security forces during protests either through abductions, killings or prosecution.
In Libya, surveillance equipment from the Muammar Gaddafi regime remained in operation.
Despite being reported as a ”country at risk” in 2013 owing to its “strict” controls over traditional media which were feared may extend to digital media, improvements were reported in Rwanda. An amended media law expanded the rights of journalists and recognised freedom for online communications.
Meanwhile, Angola’s State Security Services, with assistance from Germany, were planning to implement an electronic monitoring system to track digital communications.
Not Free
The Sudanese government was accused of surveillance particularly during protests. In addition to harassment and arrest of journalists during and following the protests, intelligence services are said to have “ramped up” efforts to censor antigovernment content, target cyber-dissidents, and manipulate online information.
In September 2012, Ethiopia “toughened” restrictions on electronic communications by passing the Telecom Fraud Offence Proclamation law. The government was also allegedly increasing its technical capacity to filter, block and monitor the internet with assistance from the Chinese authorities and the use of Finfisher – a commercial spyware software.
Globally, Iceland and Estonia were ranked the freest while China, Cuba and Iran were said to be the “most repressive countries” in terms of internet freedom.
Under the OpenNetAfrica initiative, CIPESA researches into internet freedoms in various African countries. To learn more, to share an idea or report a violation, write to programmes @cipesa.org. 

09Sep

Online Freedoms Under Siege as African Countries Seek Social Media Users’ Information

Author admin Posted on

Only a small fraction of requests made by law enforcement officials to Facebook, Google and Twitter for users’ identities or to block content originate from Africa, but there is cause to worry.
Facebook, whose popularity across Africa is growing exponentially, lists Botswana, Egypt, Ivory Coast, South Africa, and Uganda among the countries that requested users’ details in the first half of 2013. Meanwhile, last year saw seven African countries ask Google to remove content compared to only one request from the continent – by Libya – in 2010 and 2011. The beauty is that most of those requests were rejected.
No African country made a request for user account information either to Google or Twitter in the first half of 2013.
Facebook
In the first half of 2013, Botswana made three requests to Facebook related to seven users.  Egypt had eight requests regarding 11 accounts, the Ivory Coast lodged four requests, Uganda one request and South Africa 14 requests on nine users. All requests from Africa were denied.
Table 1: Facebook Data Requests (By Author from Facebook Global Government Requests Report)

Country Total Requests Users/Accounts requested Compliance rate
Botswana 3 7 0%
Egypt 8 11
Ivory Coast 4 4
Uganda 1 1
South Africa 14 9
Global Highest
India 3,245 4,144 50%
United States of America 11,000 – 12,000 20,000 – 21,000 79%

Google
Eight African countries have made at least one content removal request to Google since 2010. Djibouti’s 2012 request to block YouTube videos containing the movie Innocence of Muslims on the grounds of “religious offense” was rejected. But a similar request by Egypt was temporarily complied with, because of the “difficult circumstances” in this country at the time.
Meanwhile, a Kenyan request to remove content from blogger, arising out of a court order in a defamation case, was rejected. The Island nation of Mauritius made two content removal requests in the first half of 2012. Both were for reasons of defamation; both were rejected. Madagascar’s two requests were court-mandated on defamation grounds but Google accepted only one. Sierra Leone made one request regarding 60 items on Youtube which it wanted blocked as they portrayed or promoted violence. Google declined the request, which was made by executive not court order.
In the first half of 2012, South Africa had three court-ordered removal requests related to 11 items and Google fully complied. In the second half of 2012, Pretoria made three court ordered requests related to eight items and 33% was complied with. All South African requests were related to defamation.
Previous Google reports show that in the period July – December 2010, Libya made 68 requests for a total of 203 items to be removed from Youtube. Of these requests, 31% were complied with, either by some or all of the content being removed. In the subsequent six months, Libya’s two requests regarding five items were denied. All of Libya’s requests were not backed by a court order
Twitter
South Sudan, the continent’s youngest nation, is the only African country that made a user information request to Twitter between July and December 2012. Juba’s request was denied.

A Catalogue of Infringements
While only a handful of African countries are making these requests, there is nonetheless evidence of a worrying trend, in which African countries are taking both legal and non-legal measures to curtail the freedoms of individuals to express themselves on the internet.

The last year has seen a spiral of activity against online freedom of expression in numerous African countries. In fact, 2013 might go down as a record year in terms of curtails on internet rights on the continent.
Gambia has passed a law under which those who publish “false news” online about the government can be handed a 15 year jail term and fined up to US$90,000. Meanwhile, Zambia president Michael Sata’s government in July blocked access to the Zambian Watchdog website, accusing it of promoting hate speech. Two journalists arrested on suspicion of working with the online publishers were due to appear in court. Another website, Zambia Reports, was blocked too. Some observers said blocking the websites was part of the government’s campaign to silence independent critics.
Next door in Zimbabwe, security agencies spent several weeks in the run-up to the July 2013 general elections looking for ‘Baba Jukwa’, whose Facebook page published popular exposes of the excesses of President Robert Mugabe’s government. Three weeks before election day, there were reports Mr. Mugabe’s machinery had staked a US$300,000 bounty to unearth the identity of the whistleblower as it moved to block access to the site.
There have also been cases of bloggers charged in court in Kenya and others sought by authorities over their Facebook, blogger and Twitter posts, amidst concerns that authorities were infringing citizens’ right to free expression. The country also asked internet intermediaries to monitor their traffic for messages deemed “inflammatory” or “divisive” in a move some observers believed could be an invasion of privacy. Kenya has also ordered the blocking of access to some websites, such as Mashada.
Burundi – always a high-flying culprit in clamping on free expression – in May ordered the online newspaper www.iwacu-burundi.org to block readers’ comments for 30 days, after accusing it of publishing comments that violated media law on “national unity, public order and security, inciting ethnic hatred, defending criminal activity and insulting the head of state.”
Perhaps more than any other country in Africa, Ethiopia regularly blocks websites, undertakes surveillance of websites and social media, and charges journalists over content published offline and online. In May 2013, the Supreme Court upheld the conviction and 18-year prison sentence for journalist and blogger Eskinder Nega, convicted last year of “terrorism acts” related to his writing. The state-run telecom monopoly Ethiopia Telecom has for many years been used to filter content and hundreds of websites remain blocked. These include blogs and websites of a number of recently convicted individuals, news organisations, political parties, bloggers, and international organisations.
In Uganda, where authorities have in the past ordered internet service providers to block access to certain websites and services, the government announced it would form a social media monitoring center “to weed out those who use this media to damage the government and people’s reputations” and also targeted at those “bent to cause a security threat to the nation.” Many other countries on the continent have variously interfered with citizen’s internet rights – many times unjustifiably.
The number of requests made by African countries is therefore not reflective of the state of online freedom on the continent. This is because most governments have unilateral means of dealing with situations they do not like, without going through multilateral intermediaries. As we are witnessing, they can enact national legislations, issue uncontested orders to local intermediaries, or use extra-legal measures.
With more people on the continent getting online (mobile penetration in Africa stands at 63%, internet usage at 16% of the population), governments are likely to infringe more on citizens’ online freedoms. A challenge then is to promote awareness about protecting and promoting online freedoms. There is also a need to continuously promote responsible user behaviour online, as not all state efforts to monitor citizens’ actions online are unjustifiable.
Download the full OpenNet Africa Brief here.
To learn more about CIPESA’s OpenNet Africa project and its monitoring of online freedoms, or to share an idea or report a violation, write to: [email protected].

10Jun

Uganda’s Assurances on Social Media Monitoring Ring Hollow

Author admin Posted on

The Uganda Government’s attempt to reassure citizens that its plans to monitor social media users were not intended to curb internet rights has failed to assuage fears that authorities are clamping down on free expression of the burgeoning Uganda online community.
For one, observers say Uganda has a bad record as far as respecting citizens’ right to free expression is concerned. And this record seems to be getting worse. Secondly, the country has precedents in recent years, when the government ordered clampdowns on the citizens’ right to seek, receive, and impart information through digital technologies.
On May 30, Security Minister Muruli Musaka announced that the government would form a Social Media Monitoring Centre to “to weed out those who use it to damage the government and people’s reputations.” He accused some social media users of being “bent to cause a security threat to the nation.”
The minister made the announcement as security forces were ending a 10-day cordon of the country’s two main independent English dailies. While purportedly looking for a dossier written by the coordinator of security services, excerpts of which The Monitor and Red Pepper newspapers had published, security agencies closed the two newspapers and two radio stations run by The Monitor, for 10 days. The media houses were only reopened after signing commitments to be “responsible” in future reporting on issues related to “national security”.
The security minister’s announcement drew vibrant debate on social media and broadcast media, which prompted a government spokesperson to offer what he termed a clarification. Ofwono Opondo, head of the Uganda Media Centre and the government’s spokesperson, said the envisaged monitoring would only target cyber criminals and such types, not the majority of Uganda’s social media users whom he described as “responsible.”
Few people familiar with the Uganda government’s record are taking the spokesperson’s word. Indeed, while the legislation in Uganda states the circumstances under which an order may be made for online content to be taken down or blocked on terrorism or other grounds, recent years have seen instances of takedowns that have ignored following the law. Numerous media houses have been shut down for varying periods of time, over news and debates the government deemed a threat to national security or counter to the public interest.  There have been orders to takedown or block access to certain websites, with at least one court case against an online journalist. This, according to observers has seen the rights of human rights activists, the political opposition and media regularly trampled by state organs.
Timothy Kalyegira, editor of the online newspaper Uganda Record was in July 2010 charged with publishing material online “with intent to defame the person of the President” over articles that suggested the government was behind the July 11, 2010 twin bombs that killed 76 Ugandans in the capital Kampala. The journalist was initially charged under sedition law, but once the constitutional court declared this law unconstitutional following an appeal by journalists, defamation charges were referred against him. Security agencies also confiscated the journalist’s laptop and mobile phone.
On April 14, 2011, the regulator – the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) – instructed ISPs to block access to Facebook and Twitter for 24 hours “to eliminate the connection and sharing of information that incites the public.” The order came in the heat of the ‘walk to work’ protests in various towns over rising fuel and food prices. The regulator’s letter stated that the order had been prompted by “a request from the security agencies that there is need to minimise the use of the media that may escalate violence to the public in respect of the on-going situation due to the demonstration relating to ‘Walk to Work’, mainly by the opposition.”
Earlier in February 2011, UCC directed telecom companies to block and regulate text messages that could instigate hatred, violence and unrest during the presidential election period. The Commission issued 18 words and names which mobile phone short message service (SMS) providers were instructed to flag if they were contained in any text message. The providers were then supposed to read the rest of the message and if it was deemed to be “controversial or advanced to incite the public”, they would block it.
In February 2006, UCC reportedly instructed ISPs to block access to www.RadioKatwe.com, a website that published anti-government gossip. Authorities alleged that the website was publishing “malicious and false information against the ruling party NRM and its presidential candidate.”
The Regulation of Interception of Communications (RIC), 2010, which parliament hurriedly passed in the aftermath of the July 2010 bomb attacks, allows for interception of communications and possible intrusion into personal communications. It also requires telecom companies to collect customers’ information, including name, address and identity number, and to take other measures to enable interception. A registration of all SIM card owners in Uganda exercise concluded on May 31, 2013, which could make the monitoring easier.
Meanwhile, the Anti-Terrorism Act No.14 of 2002 gives security officers powers to intercept the communications of a person suspected of terrorist activities and to keep such persons under surveillance. The scope of the interception and surveillance includes letters and postal packages, telephone calls, faxes, emails and other communications, as well monitoring meetings of any group of persons. Others powers include the surveillance (including electronic) of individual’s movements and activities, and access to their bank accounts.
Uganda has an estimated 6.2 million internet users. Web traffic analysis by Alexa.com rank Facebook as the most accessed website in the country. Other social media sites, such as Youtube, Blogger, LinkedIn and Twitter are among the top 15.
*Under the OpenNetAfrica initiative, CIPESA researches into internet freedoms in various African countries. Read more on Intermediary Liability in Uganda here.

23May

Internet Freedom: Should Africa Prioritise Access or Security?

Author admin Posted on

By CIPESA Writer in Stockholm
An interesting conversation is taking place in the Swedish capital Stockholm. At the Stockholm Internet Forum (SIF), which is being watched online by audiences around the world, a journalist with Uganda’s Daily Monitor newspaper asked a question that is central to much of the debate here. Should people in his country be concerned about the so-called internet rights when majority of them do not even have access to the internet, and when big numbers of them lack access to clean water? As the journalist addressed a global audience of online rights activists, back home his newspaper, the two radio stations it runs, and another independent newspaper (The Red Pepper), remained shut down for a fourth day. Under the guise of searching for a document allegedly authored by the head of Uganda’s intelligence services, which President Yoweri Museveni’s government deemed a threat to national security. The police ransacked and cordoned off the media houses. Their computers and servers were being searched; the radio transmitters switched off despite a court order for the security agencies to vacate the media premises.
However, his concerns rhyme with concerns from other participants at the forum. Questions such as, should developing countries prioritise giving access to the internet to more of their citizens or should they instead dwell on improving security and privacy for current internet users?, were at the center of the discussions.
For many of the participants from Africa who spoke to CIPESA, access to the internet remains a key concern on the continent. Only a fraction of people on the continent are users of the Internet (estimated at 15% of the continent’s population). But user numbers are rising fast, driven by increased availability of affordable marine fibre optic bandwidth, a rise in private sector investments, the popularity of social media and innovative applications, not forgetting an increased use of the mobile phone to access the internet.
But as more Africans are getting online, more African governments are moving to curtail online freedoms using both legal and non-legal means. The pity, said the African observers, was that there was little understanding in African countries of the need to protect and to promote these internet rights and freedoms. More so, in most countries there were few actors talking about these matters and creating awareness about the citizens’ right to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through digital technologies.
But back to the question: should African countries priorities access or security? “It is important when you talk of the internet not to think of it chronologically,” said Ross LaJeunesse, Global Head of Free Expression and International Policy at Google. “The internet as we know it is supposed to be free and open… you would be doing a disservice to people if you offer it otherwise.” Anja Kovacs of the Internet Democracy Project in Delhi, India, agreed: we do not need to get everyone online before we start thinking of making it secure for people to be on the internet. “Security has to come at the same time as access,” said Kovacs.
Protecting internet freedoms is becoming of growing interest to academics, human rights activists and media worldwide, including in developed countries, where some governments are using the excuse of fighting cybercrime to limit citizens’ online freedoms. Ron Deibert, head of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, Canada, has led a 10-year research into this issue, and on Tuesday, May 21 launched a well-received book, Black Code in which he contends that the internet’s original promise of a global commons of shared knowledge and communications is now under threat.
Intelligence agencies that were less accountable are taking over aspects of monitoring internet freedoms. Meanwhile, citizens are placing a growing amount of data into the hands of private companies which are increasingly being asked to monitor the internet. Worryingly too is that most of the new users are coming from countries with fragile democratic systems, where internet rights could more easily be trampled.
These concerns/fears are also being investigated by CIPESA under the OpenNet Africa Project. The project is monitoring internet freedoms in a number of African countries such as Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda. We are documenting internet rights violations and reviewing cyber security policies and legislations in these countries to see how they enhance, or undermine, internet freedom.
More on SIF: http://www.stockholminternetforum.se/
Follow on twitter: @sif13

14Jan

Monitoring Internet Openness in Africa

Author admin Posted on

With internet usage continuing to spread across Africa, there are numerous purposes to which African users are putting the internet – from mobile banking, to connecting with fellow citizens and with leaders, tracking corruption and poor service delivery, innovating for social good, and just about everything else.
The increasing usage of the internet, however, has in some countries attracted the attention of authorities, who are eager to provide caveats on the openness of the internet and the range of freedoms which citizens enjoy online. The popularity of social media, the Wikileaks diplomatic cables saga and the Arab Spring uprisings have led many governments including those in Africa to recognise the power of online media.
The year 2012 saw a number of African states put curbs on Internet Rights, in what portends tougher times ahead for cyber security. According to the Freedom on the Net 2012 report published by Freedom House, both physical and technical mechanisms of filtering, monitoring or otherwise obstructing free speech online have been employed by states concerned with the power of internet-based technologies.
In its study, Freedom House covered developments in internet freedom in 47 countries around the world.  Based on an examination of obstacles to access, limits to content, and violation of user rights on the internet, countries were scored as ‘Free’, Partly Free’ or ‘Not Free’. The study found that in Sub Saharan Africa, Ethiopia was the only country to implement nationwide internet filtering. Meanwhile, South Africa and Kenya were reported as the most free. The former was credited for its high internet usage compared to other countries at the same level of development and the latter for its “growing diversity in content and fewer cases of arrest or censorship than in previous years.”
Ethiopia was reported as using paid pro-government commentators to manipulate internet discussions. There were also crackdowns and prosecutions of online,journalists as well a law that since 2002 prohibits the use of VoIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol). In Zimbabwe, regime critics were said to often be faced with politically motivated cyber attacks.
Even Kenya, all its ICT sector positives notwithstanding, was reported as one of the governments seeking “less visible means” to control internet freedoms. The Country’s communications regulatory is reportedly setting up a surveillance system to monitor email communications due to cyber security threats. Pending legislation in South Africa, which requires telecommunications service providers to broaden their surveillance obligations, was also noted as having the potential to mass monitor communications.
Despite having relatively low restrictions on internet usage, Rwanda was reported as a ”country at risk” in 2013 owing to its “strict” controls over traditional media which are feared may extend to digital media.
Freedom House ranked Nigeria, Uganda, and Zimbabwe as ‘Partly Free’.
In 2013 through to 2014, CIPESA will be undertaking a project to monitor and promote internet freedoms in Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda. We shall be reporting on legal regimes on internet openness or the lack of it, censorship incidents and African initiatives that are promoting internet rights, among others.
Read more about CIPESA’s Internet Governance and Online Freedoms work.

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