Photographer: Dhiraj Singh / Bloomberg
Photographer: Dhiraj Singh / Bloomberg
The closure of the Internet has cost India $ 2.8 billion, placing the South Asian nation at the top of the list of 21 countries that have restricted citizens’ web access in 2020.
India – the second most affected nation by the Covid-19 pandemic in terms of confirmed infections in general – accounted for about three-quarters of the $ 4 billion lost worldwide due to internet borders. There are more than doubled losses compared to 2019, showed a report of a research group on privacy and digital security in the UK.
Some countries known to restrict Internet access or censor material, such as China and North Korea, were not included in the report because researchers relied on publicly available open source information and documented closures of the Internet and social media. .
With 8,927 hours of black or limited bandwidth access, India has restricted internet use more than any other nation, as the restrictions originally imposed in 2019 continued throughout 2020, according to the Global Cost of Internet Closures. report published by Top10VPN.
Interruption costs
Band width restrictions in Kashmir – where the government in 2019 revoked the special autonomous status of the country’s only Muslim-majority state – affected access to medicines, businesses and schools, despite a seven-month relaxation period close in March, it was said.
The Indian Ministry of Information and Technology did not respond to an email requesting a response to the report’s findings.
The cost of Internet outages was calculated using indicators from groups, inclusive World Bank, International Telecommunication Union and Software Freedom Law Center in Delhi. Includes shutting down social media in its calculations.
Belarus suffered the most economically after India, with $ 336.4 million lost in 218 hours of disruptions and curbs that affected 7.9 million people. protests following controversial presidential elections. During the period of restrictions, the report documented a 650% increase in demand for virtual private networks in Belarus, the report said.
Myanmar has imposed disruptions and restricted bandwidth for 5,160 hours in 2020, amid continued restrictions in the Chin and Rakhine regions, he said. Yemen lost $ 237 million to 912 hours of internet outages.
At 27,165 hours, major internet disruptions worldwide in 2020 were 49% higher than the previous year and affected 268 million people, according to the report. About 42 percent of the shutdowns were associated with additional human rights abuses, including restrictions on freedom of assembly, electoral interference and violations of press freedom, he said.