The Ethiopian government systematically and illegally blocked access

to social media and news websites in its efforts to crush dissent and

prevent reporting of attacks on protesters by security forces during the

wave of protests that started in November 2015 and led up to the state

of emergency, a new report released today shows.

Research conducted by Amnesty International and the Open

Observatory

of Network Interference (OONI) between June and October 2016

shows

that access to WhatsApp was blocked, as well as at least 16 news outlets.

“It’s clear that as far as the Ethiopian government is concerned, social

media is a tool for extremists peddling bigotry and hate and therefore

they

are fully justified in blocking internet access. The reality, though, is very different. The widespread censorship has closed another space for

Ethiopian’s to air the grievances that fueled the protests,” said Michelle Kagari, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for East Africa,

the Horn and the Great Lakes.

“The internet blocking had no basis in law, and was another

disproportionate and excessive response to the protests. This raises

serious concerns that overly broad censorship will become

institutionalized under the state of emergency.”

Rather than closing off all spaces for people to express their concerns, the authorities need to actively engage with, and

address the underlying human rights violations that have fueled the protests over the last year.

The report also found that the Ethiopian government uses Deep

Packet Inspection (DPI) technology to filter access to websites.

DPI is a technology that can be bought and deployed on any network.

Though it has many legitimate functions, it can also enable monitoring

and filtering of internet traffic. 

“Our findings provide incontrovertible evidence of systematic

interference with access to numerous websites belonging to

independent news organizations and political opposition groups,

as well as sites supporting freedom of expression and lesbian, gay,

bisexual, transgender and intersex rights,” said Maria Xynou of OONI.

“Tor Metrics data illustrate that more and more people were trying to

access censorship circumvention tools, such as TOR, which indicated

that the internet was inaccessible through the normal routes. This all

paints a picture of a government intent on stifling expression and free exchange of information.”

The study was conducted to investigate whether and to what extent

internet censorship was actually taking place, after Amnesty and OONI contacts inside Ethiopia consistently reported unusually slow internet connections and inability to access social media websites.

Our findings provide incontrovertible evidence of systematic interference with access to numerous websites belonging to independent news organizations and political opposition groups, as well as sites supporting freedom of expression and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex rights

They also reported that internet access on mobile devices had been completely blocked in Amhara, Addis Ababa and Oromia in the lead

up to protests in the three regions on 6 and 7 August. This was confirmed

in Google’s transparency reports for the period between July and November 2016, which showed a dramatic drop in internet traffic out of Ethiopia on

the two days when at least 100 people were killed by security forces during the protests.

“Rather than closing off all spaces for people to express their concerns,

the authorities need to actively engage with, and address the underlying human rights violations that have fueled the protests over the last year. The authorities must allow people to express their opinions even when they criticize government policies and actions; both online and offline,” said Michelle Kagari. 

“We urge the government to refrain from blocking access to internet

sites

and instead commit its resources to addressing its citizens’ legitimate grievances.”

Background

Ethiopia has been hit by a wave of protests since November 2015 when

ethnic Oromos took to the streets to protest against possible land seizures under the government’s Addis Ababa Masterplan, which aimed to expand

the capital’s administrative control into Oromia.

The protests later spread to Amhara, with demands for an end to

arbitrary arrests, as well as respect for regional autonomy rights enshrined

in the constitution.

Most of the protests were met with excessive force from the security forces. The worst incident involved the death of possibly hundreds of protesters

in a stampede on 2 October at Bishoftu.