Enhancing Internet freedom and human rights through responsible business practices

WHY WE BOTHER The events in the Middle East and North Africa in 2011 demonstrated the important role of the Internet in mobilising people to demand justice, equality and human rights. The Arab Spring spread fast to Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria and other Arab countries. Within less than a month, Tunisia’s Ben Ali was forced to step down and flee, and in Egypt one month later, Hosni Mubarak was forced to resign.

These developments instilled fear in the authoritarian leaders in the region, especially as the riots spread so quickly. What made this possible was access to information technology. One of the demonstrators in Cairo said: “We use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter to coordinate and YouTube to tell the world.” Social media and the Internet have not created the demonstrations, but they have played a key role in spreading protests and gathering the masses.

This ultimately led to Mubarak’s decision to simply shut down the Internet in Egypt. But with the fixed telephone network up and running, people could use the old dial-up modems to communicate and organise protests.

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