Countries Seeing Internet Shutdowns in 2022-2023 and Their Reasons

By Aarti Dhapte , 10 March, 2023

The most expensive internet blockage of 2022 is caused by Russia, by blocking and controlling the access to social media and outlets of news. The economic cost of the internet service puts the country at $21.6 billion. The large number of people are affected by the price tags since the blockages are country-wide.

The restriction over the internet moves Russia to the second rank in the list ahead of Iran. According to the reports, 72 million people got affected by the shutdown of internet at an economic cost of $773 million. Kazakhstan is at third rank after the internet shutdowns by following early 2022 protests regarding the fuel prices over the $400 million economic damage.

In 2022, Myanmar is the country to witness internet shut down for the longest period that is 17,500 hours. The Twitter ban in Nigeria was lifted in the beginning of 2022. Around 100 million people were affected in the whole country in the month of January. As per the information, an economic cost of $83 million was racked up. The survey reports reveal that Ethiopia in 2022 saw longer shutdowns for 9000 hours. But in Tigray region, very less people were affected and it cost around $146 million even if the restrictions were going on. The positive data being noted by the surveys is that the drop in number of countries cuts the internet during election times, the number fall to five countries doing so in 2022 from 12 in 2021.