Sub-Saharan Africa

Country Profile: Zimbabwe
Background Since Zimbabwe’s independence from Great Britain in 1980, the country has been tightly controlled by President Robert Mugabe and the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), which is known for severe repression and continuing violations of human rights.Freedom House, “Freedom in...
Country Profile: Ethiopia
Background Ethiopia’s record on human rights and political openness took a turn for the worse after the legislative elections of May 2005. Though originally hailed by the U.S. State Department as “a milestone in creating a new, more competitive multi-party political system in...
ONI Blog: Rwandan Government Accused of Role in Online Journalist's Murder
A Rwandan online journalist's death late last year has stirred up controversy, with some alleging the Rwandan government had a hand in the murder. Charles Ingabire, an online news editor for the news website Inyenyeri, was shot last month in a...
ONI Blog: New Data Added to ONI's Social Media Filtering Map
The OpenNet Initiative is excited to announce the addition of a full year of new data to its Social Media Filtering Map. The map gives users a visual overview where of Facebook, Flickr, Orkut, Twitter, and Youtube have been blocked since...
ONI Blog: Threats to the Open Net: July 8th, 2011
Every week, the OpenNet Initiative provides a weekly news roundup (dubbed "Threats to the Open Net") in addition to our usual in-depth blog posts. If you would like to subscribe to the RSS feed for our newsreel, our entire blog,...
ONI Blog: Rwanda blocks website of independent newspaper
Exactly one year after the murder of independent newspaper Umuvugizi’s deputy editor, the paper's website is again inaccessible in Rwanda. Its editor has just re-launched the paper as an online-only publication. Last weekend, Umuvugizi went online with a re-launched version of...
ONI Blog: Nigerian govt. shuts down Internet and mobile networks during presidential inauguration
Multiple Nigerian newspapers and Twitter users are reporting that Internet and mobile networks were inaccessible for 12 hours in Abuja during President Goodluck Jonathan's inauguration on Sunday, May 29. Sam Nda-Isaiah of the Abuja-based daily newspaper Leadership writes: The state security forces virtually...
ONI Blog: Ugandan Government Asks ISPs to Block Facebook, Twitter
With the exception of Ethiopia, which blocks a number of political and security-related websites, and a few cases of isolated Internet censorship related to political events, most of sub-Saharan Africa has historically been free of technical filtering. This week,...
ONI Blog: Tunisian Government Websites Attacked Via DDoS
The repercussions of Tunisia’s strict online censorship reached an apex in the Arab country this week as multiple DDoS attacks continue to target the government. Hackers known collectively as the Anonymous group took down at least eight government websites beginning...