Shutdowns on social media services have become an increasingly popular measure for oppressive regimes to control public sentiment and freedom of speech. The tendency to block access to social media sites is especially prevalent in countries where state authorities own or control the internet infrastructure. This enables the authorities to quickly employ sporadic shutdowns to disrupt the expected movements of the democratic public.
Our live social media shutdown tracker is being continuously updated with new cases of disruptions based on people’s reports and global news stories.
Report it hereAfrican and Asian countries block access to social media the most, while Australia and Oceania had zero recorded cases of social media restrictions.
The practice of limiting social media access is usually the product of anti-democratic governments seeking to suppress citizens’ freedom.
Social media blocking in most countries is more of an on-and-off occurrence instead of a permanent decision.
There are 6 countries with ongoing bans on social media – all of them in Asia.
In 1 out of 3 countries systematic social media restrictions have been reported since 2015. Most of the outages have been related to political or societal events such as elections, referendums and protests.
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have blocked or heavily restricted access to social media in the past seven years
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April 3, 2022
Multiple social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Viber, and YouTube, were restricted in Sri Lanka. The government declares a state of emergency, imposing curfews to counter widespread protests over the economic crisis.
SourceFebruary 26, 2022
Twitter restrictions have been recorded in Russia from February 26, 2022 with subsequent restriction of Facebook servers as of Sunday. Social media platforms became largely unusable as Russian authorities and social media platforms clash over platform rules in relation to the invasion of Ukraine.
SourceFebruary 20, 2022
Internet slowdown on Sunday limited the coverage of a major political opposition rally in Harare. The incident impacts multiple operators and has prevented live streaming from the Yellow Sunday demonstration against the ruling political organization ZANU–PF.
SourceJanuary 23, 2022
Internet service was significantly disrupted at a national scale in Burkina Faso on January 23rd. The incident comes amid an uprising and gunfire at military camps.
SourceJanuary 18, 2022
The loss of internet service was recorded in parts of Beirut, Lebanon from the evening of Saturday, January 15th. The intermittent connectivity disruptions follow an escalating pattern of destabilization of infrastructure as the country’s energy crisis deepens.
SourceJanuary 10, 2022
Significant internet disruptions were recorded in Burkina Faso amid arrests related to an alleged coup plot. Incident was observed from the afternoon of January 10, 2022, and as of Tuesday 11th, reports likely indicated the restriction of Facebook and WhatsApp.
SourceJanuary 4, 2022
A significant internet service disruption was recorded in Kazakhstan on the evening of Tuesday, January 4, 2022. The incident has a high impact on mobile services and comes amid protests against sudden energy price rises in the town of Zhanaozen.
SourceNovember 25, 2021
Internet disruption was registered in Iran from Thursday morning to Saturday. The incident may be connected to protests against the government’s water management policies in the southwestern city of Ahvaz.
SourceNovember 22, 2021
A significant mobile internet disruption in Burkina Faso was recorded amid unrest against the shooting of protesters by a French military convoy on the 20th of November. It is the first time when Burkina Faso has blocked its internet since 2015.
SourceNovember 8, 2021
Various social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Facebook, and Facebook Messenger were blocked after 12th-grade national exam papers were reportedly leaked online.
SourceOctober 25, 2021
A significant disruption to internet service in Sudan was recorded from Monday, October 25th 2021, affecting cellular and some fixed-line connectivity on multiple providers. Senior government officials have been detained in an apparent military coup attempt.
SourceSeptember 17, 2021
A popular opposition election tracking app has been removed from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. The incident came as Russia held parliamentary elections from September 17th to 19th 2021.
SourceAugust 30, 2021
Internet disrupted in South Sudan amid anti-government planned protests organised by the People’s Coalition for Civil Action (PCCA), which is calling for the leadership to resign.
SourceAugust 12, 2021
Social media platforms Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and messaging apps Messenger and WhatsApp have been restricted on multiple internet providers in Zambia amid presidential and parliamentary elections.
SourceJuly 12, 2021
Partial restrictions have been placed on social media and messaging platforms following widespread protests against socialist government’s policies and rising prices.
SourceJune 5, 2021
Nigeria banned Twitter after the social media site removed a post by President Muhammadu Buhari threatening secessionists.
SourceMarch 26, 2021
Facebook and Messenger restricted in Bangladesh amid Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the capital city of Bangladesh, Dhaka.
SourceMarch 21, 2021
Republic of the Congo shutdown the internet on the day of presidential elections, Sunday 21 March 2021.
SourceMarch 5, 2021
The arrest of the opposition leader Ousmane Sonko in Senegal has led to demonstrations in Dakar. Restrictions of online services have been reported after the clashes between police and the protesters spurred.
SourceFebruary 28, 2021
Following a raid at the property of Yaya Dillo, a representative of Chad's opposition, access to the internet form within the country was being hindered.
SourceFebruary 1, 2021
As the Myanmar military took power over the weekend following their accusations of election fraud, internet disruption affected large parts of the country on February 1, 2021.
SourceJanuary 23, 2021
On 2021, January 23. Internet disrupted in Russia amid anti-Kremlin protests.
SourceJanuary 12, 2021
On January 12, 2021, Uganda orders social media blocking ahead of election.
SourceNovember 30, 2020
Social media disrupted on November 30, 2020 amid protests in Havana by a group calling for artistic rights.
SourceOctober 27, 2020
On the eve of general elections, October 27, 2020, Tanzania saw disruption to social media and online communication platforms.
SourceSeptember 27, 2020
Following clashes with Armenia on September 27, 2020, Azerbaijan authorities restricted access to many popular social media and communication platforms.
SourceSeptember 13, 2020
On September 13, 2020, Algerian authorities restricted social media access and cut internet connection nation-wide to prevent exam papers from leaking and discourage cheating among students.
SourceThe social media censorship tracker analyzes the global situation by looking at five regions and highlighting the most prominent cases of interruptions. Bellow we deep dive into the regions of Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Oceania.
32 countries blocked social media in the past
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Cutting off access to social media is a common practice in African countries, especially during elections, protests, demonstrations, or exams.
32 out of 54 countries in Africa have blocked access to social media
platforms since 2015.
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Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Burundi, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Gambia, Guinea, Togo, Tanzania, Benin, DRC, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Sierra Leone, Zambia have restricted access to social media in the past due to elections.
Algeria, Burkina Faso, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Liberia, Mali, South Sudan, Senegal, Zimbabwe have restricted access to social media in the past due to protests and demonstrations.
People fear that the government will resurrect the bill since they’ve been vocal about social media regulations again. The authorities justify such attempts by claiming they want to manage fake news and hate speech. Still, the public sees questionable social media laws as a means to stifle online expression.
Nigeria’s government proposed a “frivolous petitions” bill to regulate social media. The punishment for social media posts criticizing the said law would be jail time and a $10,000 fine. However, following widespread public criticism, the bill was withdrawn.
24 countries blocked social media in the
past and 6 are currently blocking social media
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From total Western social media shutdown to blocking Youtube because of leaked sexual content portraying politicians, more than half of all Asian countries have been limiting access to social media.
30 out of 46 countries in Asia have been cracking
down on social media usage since 2015
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Shows no mercy to foreign social media, but they have an entire ecosystem of Chinese-based social media platforms like WeChat, Weibo, QQ, and Qzone.
The authorities blocked YouTube twice in 2016 following the release of sex videos depicting Georgian politicians.
Has blocked social media platforms after the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict flared up in September, 2020.
6 countries blocked social media in the past
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While North America doesn’t have recorded cases in social media restrictions, several countries in South America have dipped their toes in it.
6 countries out of 35 have practiced social media blocking in
the Americas since 2015
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Social media disruptions and internet shutdowns in Venezuela began when Juan Guaido swore himself in as an interim president of Venezuela in 2019, following the 2018 elections that were widely deemed fraudulent.
In an attempt to stop as many Guaido speeches from airing, Nicolas Maduro’s government blocked access to social media anytime Guaido or his associates went on public appearances or livestreamed. Similar cases were recorded at least 12 times in 2019.
4 countries blocked social media in the past
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While there are no recorded social media bans in Western Europe, the East of the continent tells a different story.
There have been cases reported in 4 out of 44 countries in South to Eastern Europe restricting access to social media services
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There are currently no recorded social media blocks in Australia and Oceania.
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Some of the more recent social media restriction cases in Nigeria, Senegal, and Uganda showed massive increases in downloads, VPN free trial opt-ins, and website visits at Surfshark. Our VPN services can help people bypass internet restrictions and censorships. This shows that amid government-imposed social media blackouts, their citizens individually turn to tools for freedom of speech.
Almost one in three countries have blocked social media either permanently or sporadically since 2015.
While governments justify restricting social media due to security reasons, more often than not it happens amidst protests and demonstrations.
Our data also shows our VPN use rates skyrocket during these cases.
The constraints of our methodology mean that there may be cases of social media blockings that have gone unnoticed or unreported, and numbers are likely to change if and when new information becomes available.
The data measures social media blockings from 2015 till the present day. Social media was conceptualized as social networking sites (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube etc.) and communication apps, including VoIPs (i.e. Skype, WhatsApp, Telegram, Viber). Both local and national social media blockings have been taken into account in the study.
The data was collected through open-source information from Freedom House, Netblocks and reputable news reports.
