The Global Cost of Internet Shutdowns

Myanmar has been convulsed by protests against a military coup in February. After an initial internet blackout, the ruling military junta blocked access to Facebook in the wake of the coup in order to “maintain stability”.

Since then the people of Myanmar were subject to rolling restrictions with social media blocked during the day and a nightly internet shutdown that only ended on 27 April after 72 consecutive nights. Peaceful demonstrations turned deadly as the authorities cracked down, killing scores of protesters.

With the growing death toll now thought to be over 700, with children among those killed by security forces, mobile internet was cut completely on March 15. On April 1, the military junta ordered a further shutdown of wireless internet services.

Since April 28, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp remain blocked, while internet access is limited to government-approved “whitelisted” sites only.

India is again a world leader in self-inflicted economic damage from internet shutdowns. The Modhi government continued to throttle internet speeds to effectively unusable 2G levels in Kashmir until early February. It also implemented a costly blackout during the massive farmers’ protests outside Delhi in late January.

Authorities in Nigeria shut down Twitter on June 5 in retaliation for the removal of a tweet by President Muhammadu Buhari for breaching the social media platform’s rules.

In Uganda, authorities shut down social media in January ahead of the presidential elections. The disruptions helped prevent the spread of information about brutal crackdowns on opposition rallies that left at least 28 dead and many hundreds arrested.

India continued to restrict internet access more than any other country. Most were highly-targeted short blackouts, affecting groups of villages or individual city districts, and so were not included in this report, which focused on major disruptions. The true economic cost is therefore likely to be even higher than the $2.8BN we calculated.

Authorities lifted restrictions in Kashmir in March 2020, seven months on from a controversial decision to strip India’s only Muslim-majority region of its autonomy. However, after the restrictions were lifted authorities continued to severely throttle internet speeds, with citizens only able to access 2G connections.

During the longest internet shutdown in a democracy, the arbitrary arrest of prominent Kashmiris became widespread.

In Belarus, authorities restricted internet access in August and September following a controversial presidential election as president Alexander Lukashenko attempted to stifle protests and calls for a re-run of the vote.

During the internet restrictions, there were multiple reports of police brutality, torture, and attacks on the press.

Meanwhile in Yemen, damage to an undersea cable in January reduced the country’s internet capacity by 80%. Some claimed it was a deliberate act of sabotage by the Houthi rebels that control large swathes of the country, however this remains unconfirmed.

In Iraq, internet blackouts were imposed in October after anti-government protests flared due to rising unemployment, failing public services and corruption. The disruptions were part of a brutal government crackdown that led to at least 220 deaths and injuries to many hundreds of people.

Sudan was rocked by unrest throughout the first half of the year after protests erupted calling for Omar al-Bashir, who had been in power for thirty years, to step down. Extended social media shutdowns were imposed as a response. Protests continued following a military coup, which prompted internet blackouts intended to prevent the flow of information, such as the recovery of at least 40 bodies from the River Nile.

Internet disruption cost African economies over $2 billion in total during 2019.

In India, the most significant disruptions were in Kashmir, where after intermittent shutdowns in the first half of the year, access was blocked from August onwards. The Modhi government attempted to justify the blackout on national security grounds due to unrest following the controversial decision to strip India’s only Muslim-majority region of its autonomy.

Elsewhere, violent reactions to the Citizenship Amendment Bill, which was viewed as specifically anti-Muslim, prompted blackouts in December across parts of several northern regions of India.