Internet shutdowns at record high in Africa as access ‘weaponised’
Digital blackouts reached a record high in 2024 in Africa as more governments sought to keep millions of citizens off the internet than in any other period over the last decade.A report released by the internet rights group Access Now and #KeepItOn, a coalition of hundreds of civil society organisations worldwide, found there were 21 shutdowns in 15 African countries, surpassing the existing record of 19 shutdowns in 2020 and 2021.Authorities in Comoros, Guinea-Bissau and Mauritius joined repeat offenders such as Burundi, Ethiopia, Equatorial Guinea and Kenya.Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal and Tanzania were also on the list.But perpetrators also included militias and other non-state actors.
Telecommunication and internet service providers who shut services based on government orders are also complicit in violating people’s rights, said Felicia Anthonio, the #KeepItOn campaign manager at Access Now, citing the UN guiding principles on business and human rights.The details showed that most of the shutdowns were imposed as a response to conflicts, protests and political instability.There were also restrictions during elections.The trend was replicated across the world with more internet shutdowns and in more countries: 296 shutdowns across 54 countries, compared with 283 shutdowns in 39 countries the previous year.Access Now said the figures were the worst since it started keeping records in 2016 and that the rise reflected “a world where internet access is consistently weaponised, restricted, and precarious”.
“Behind each of the 1,754 shutdowns since 2016 is a story of people and communities cut off from the world and each other, often during political upheaval, unrest, violence and war,” the report said.At least five shutdowns in Africa had been imposed for more than a year by the end of 2024, according to Access Now.As of early 2025, the social network Meta was still restricted in Uganda, despite authorities engaging with its representatives.On the Equatorial Guinean island of Annobon, internet and cell services have been cut off since an August 2024 protest over environmental concerns and isolation from the rest of the country.The increase in shutdowns led the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights to pass a landmark resolution in March 2024 to help reverse the trend.
Sign up to The Long WaveNesrine Malik and Jason Okundaye deliver your weekly dose of Black life and culture from around the worldafter newsletter promotionBut the regression had continued, said Anthonio,“It’s rather unfortunate we saw more election-related shutdowns in Africa and other places in 2024 despite the adoption of the ACHPR resolution last year,” she said,“Despite this, the resolution is a positive step as it has served as a vital resource and reference for civil society’s advocacy against rights-harming shutdowns,It is difficult for us to tell if the resolution is yielding results already, but we did see authorities in countries like Mauritius and South Sudan [in January 2025] backtrack or reverse shutdown orders,”
‘An ideal tool’: prisons are using virtual reality to help people in solitary confinement
Participants view scenes of daily life as well as travel adventures – then process the emotions they trigger through artOne Monday in July, Samantha Tovar, known as Royal, left her 6ft-by-11ft cell for the first time in three weeks. Correctional officers escorted her to the common area of the Central California Women’s Facility and chained her hands and feet to a metal table, on top of which sat a virtual reality headset. Two and a half years into a five-year prison sentence, Royal was about to see Thailand for the first time.When she first put on the headset, Royal immediately had an aerial view of a cove. Soon after, her view switched to a boat moving fairly fast with buildings on either side of the water
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Australian Tesla sales plummet as owners rush to distance themselves from Elon Musk
Australian Tesla owners troubled by the increasingly extreme rightwing politics of the company’s co-founder, Elon Musk, are offloading their electric vehicles or using bumper stickers to distance themselves from the Trump-aligned billionaire.Fresh vehicle sales data for February – which covered the weeks after Musk’s apparent fascist salute at a Trump inauguration rally – showed a steep decline in Tesla purchases. Sales were down about 72% compared to the same month in 2024.Sales of Tesla’s Model 3 – the company’s entry-level model which had been the second-best selling EV in Australia in 2024 – were down 81%.Tesla’s sliding popularity in Australia comes amid several other trends in the market such as the move away from pure battery electric cars in favour of hybrid vehicles; the increasing availability of cheaper Chinese rivals; and the broader waning appetite for cars that saw Australians buy 10,000 fewer vehicles in February than the same month in 2024
‘Trump Gaza’ AI video intended as political satire, says creator
The creator of the viral “Trump Gaza” AI-generated video depicting the Gaza Strip as a Dubai-style paradise has said it was intended as a political satire of Trump’s “megalomaniac idea”.The video – posted by Trump on his Truth Social account last week – depicts a family emerging from the wreckage of war-torn Gaza into a beachside resort town lined with skyscrapers. Trump is seen sipping cocktails with a topless Benjamin Netanyahu on sun loungers, while Elon Musk tears flatbread into dips.The video first emerged in February, shortly after Trump unveiled his property development plan for Gaza, under which he said he wants to “clean out” the population of about 2 million people to create the “Riviera of the Middle East”.Trump then posted the clip without any explanation on his Truth Social platform on 26 February
UK watchdog drops competition review of Microsoft’s OpenAI partnership
The UK’s competition watchdog will not hold a formal investigation into Microsoft’s partnership with the startup behind the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, stating that while the $2.9tn (£2.3tn) tech company has “material influence” over OpenAI it does not control it.The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said Microsoft, OpenAI’s biggest financial backer with a $13bn investment, acquired material influence over the San Francisco-based business in 2019 but did not exercise de facto control over it – and therefore did not meet the threshold for an official inquiry.The decision follows expressions of disquiet over the appointment of the former boss of Amazon UK, Doug Gurr, as the CMA’s interim chair
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