According to Freedom House, internet watchdogs generally agree that internet freedom will decline again in 2024, the 14th consecutive decline.
The decline in internet freedom over the past year has been largely driven by the rise of military regimes, the spread of Islamist speech norms, and the general rise in authoritarian rule, including the spread of authoritarianism in the previously free world, particularly in the United Kingdom. It was a great reinforcement.
Freedom House annual report “Freedom on the Net” (FOTN) sadly observed Myanmar's military regime is now comparable to communist China as “the world's worst environment for internet freedom”.
Military governments tend to be paranoid and view dissent as treason, and are quick to restrict access to the internet and terrorize the population with harsh penalties for “unacceptable” online speech. .
Freedom House says Myanmar's military regime has excelled in both of these miseries, having “carried out a brutal and violent crackdown on dissent” and established “an extensive censorship and surveillance regime” over the past year. pointed out.
Like most other authoritarian regimes around the world, Myanmar is increasingly determined to prevent its subjects from using virtual private networks (VPNs) to circumvent the regime's internet controls. Pakistan Islamic Ideology Council announced In November, he claimed that the use of VPN technology was against Islam. sharia The law gives Islamic governments the right to prevent the “spread of evil” by suppressing blasphemy.
Myanmar military junta spokesperson General Zaw Min Tun speaks to the press during the Armed Forces Day ceremony in Naypyidaw on March 27, 2024. (Photo courtesy of AFP)
US Department of State held In September, a meeting was held with civil society groups and tech companies to discuss the fight against VPNs. VPNs are an essential resource for “billions of people around the world who want to access the free, open, global Internet as we experience it in the United States.”
The State Department says VPNs are one of the few effective weapons against “digital oppression,” and protecting the technology should be a top priority for all defenders of internet freedom. said.
myanmar purchased Much of the surveillance and censorship technology comes from the People's Republic of China (PRC), which extends internet freedom across borders by exporting both authoritarian ideology and the hardware needed to impose censorship. continues to decline. One reason for the decline in freedom on the Internet is that the technologies that turn virtual frontiers into dungeons have become cheaper and more powerful. strengthened It is powered by artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
China has been a leader in harnessing the power of AI to enforce censorship. The scale of China's internet police is vast, and AI will greatly increase its effectiveness, sweeping billions of online messages of prohibited images and content.
Furthermore, China's early artificial intelligence systems themselves tied up In the chain of communist ideology and speech norms from the moment of its creation. AI pioneers worry that censorship will spread quickly as artificial intelligence builds its knowledge base from information that has been modified or restricted by Beijing and other authoritarian regimes.
Visitors interact with a Go robot at the 2024 World Artificial Intelligence Products Application Expo held in Suzhou, China on December 10, 2024 (Photo courtesy of Costfoto/NurPhoto, Getty Images)
Freedom House says 2024 is an election year for many parts of the free world, and governments are deeply concerned about foreign “interference” in elections by spreading “disinformation.” He pointed out that there is a tendency to create a more oppressive online environment.
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) noticed The country's year-end review noted that some countries, including India and Pakistan in particular, have developed a habit of severely restricting internet access during elections.
A significant part of the 14-year steady decline in internet freedom can be attributed to the global war on disinformation. Disinformation itself is also a threat to online freedom, as fraud is always a form of coercion.
Free countries still struggle to find the right balance between respecting free speech online and combating disinformation campaigns, but brutally frankly, governments must avoid all information that poses a threat. They don't necessarily have a hard time finding that balance because they tend to keep things classified. The ruling party and bureaucracy should be suppressed as “disinformation''. The search for a truly fair and honest information broker may never end.
As grim as the news from Myanmar was, the steepest decline in internet freedom Freedom House found in 2024 was in Kyrgyzstan under President Sadyr Japarov. Kyrgyzstan It became clear The government's all-out war on anti-government media websites, restrictions on Internet access by its citizens, aggressive “foreign agent” laws that paint all opposition media as puppets of hostile foreign governments, and dissident media. All trends in global online repression are occurring simultaneously, including brutal retaliation against Individual citizens towards online discourse.
The latter is an alarming trend in the decline of internet freedom, and this is not limited to third world despotism. England descended The past year has seen frequent bouts of dystopian fear among the nation. punished Posting on social media carries severe prison sentences. It's no longer a joke in the UK that you're more likely to go to jail for complaining about a crime than for complaining about it.
“In three-quarters of countries covered by FOTN, internet users have been arrested for non-violent expression, sometimes facing harsh prison sentences of more than 10 years,” Freedom House notes. did.
“At least 43 countries have reached record highs in the number of people physically attacked or killed in retaliation for their online activities,” the report added.
diplomat noticed No country in Southeast Asia achieved the minimum score of 70 out of 100 required by Freedom House to be considered “free.” Malaysia and the Philippines were the closest with 60 points. Most other countries scored below 50, with Thailand dropping to 39 due to relentless prosecutions seen as insults to the monarchy, and Vietnam creeping up to 22 due to its imitation of communist China's authoritarianism.
Deutsche Welle (DW) quotation Advocates worried that internet freedom could be “eroding” in Southeast Asia as Western technology companies bow to censorship demands from communist, militarist and Islamist governments. Southeast Asia's most repressive government has threatened to shut down social media platforms if they do not comply with censorship demands within hours.
“Today, governments in Southeast Asia even pretend to be actively working to improve and protect online freedoms. is prioritizing online control and regulation,” Sean Crispin of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CJP) lamented to DW.
“For many people across Asia, the internet is a canvas to express their thoughts and showcase their lives, as well as a primary source of news. It's no surprise that people are increasingly using all kinds of technological controls to control what they share,” said Phil Robertson, director of the Asian Human Rights and Labor Advocacy Group.
D.W. Citing a recent Pew Research Center poll, he said most respondents in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Cambodia believe “social harmony” is more important than freedom of speech, and others Majority minorities in many Southeast Asian countries also feel this way, calling it a cultural trend. This region is highly susceptible to online repression.
In Western countries, two very sensitive issues circumvented the boundaries of internet freedom and security in 2024. Prohibited China's TikTok in the US is a risk to both data security and social cohesion, and Australia's aggressive move prevent Prevent children under 16 from using social media.
Strangely, Freedom House's 2024 FOTN report doesn't examine either of these issues in detail, but banning TikTok and keeping teens away from social media both Even if you agree that they are good ideas, both are very relevant to the internet freedom debate.
Former Rep. Jamal Bowman (NY-16) speaks at a press conference in support of freedom of expression with Bowman, Pocan, Garcia and TikTok creators at the Capitol on March 22, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo credit: Tasos Katapodis/Getty Images for TikTok)
TikTok has a large user base in the United States who would be upset about losing access to the platform, and some users make money by generating TikTok content. So, if their favorite social media service is blocked, they will definitely feel that their internet freedom is under attack.
Similarly, critics of efforts to keep children off social media argue that banning them deprives them of access to helpful communities and useful information and does more harm than good. I am doing it. Although most Australian adults from all political parties support the under-16 ban, 15-year-olds will wake up one morning in 2025 to find they can no longer access their favorite social media platform. There is no doubt that it will be less. free Even more than he was the day before.
Many other countries, including the United States, have taken steps to keep children off social media, but are generally aiming for earlier deadlines than Australia. The issue is part of a much larger international debate about children's rights and the age of consent for various activities, but constant access to the internet via mobile devices becomes entrenched in childhood. As time goes by, these problems become even more difficult.
The 2024 FOTN report concludes with a series of policy recommendations, with Freedom House's top recommendation being for governments around the world to “promote freedom of expression and access to information.” At the dawn of 2025, it will be too hard to find a government that really wants that.
