Past

Service blocking

Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and YouTube

Access to popular social media and messaging platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and YouTube, have reportedly been cut as the country heads to its national elections on May 20. The shutdown comes amidst concerns of possible violence during and after the elections.

  • Total Duration 1 day

Flag of Burundi Burundi

Population
14,047,786
UN Classification
  • Least Developed Country
  • Land Locked Developing Country

View full country profile for Burundi

Other supporting information

OONI data collected from Burundi shows that multiple social media websites were blocked on Econet (AS37336) on May 20.

Chart: Blocking of social media websites in Burundi on May 20 (source: OONI data).

What is evident from the above chart is that all of the tested social media websites consistently presented network anomalies every time they were tested on May 20. The fact that each of these sites was tested multiple times on that day on Econet (AS37336), and that their testing always presented anomalies, provides a strong signal of potential blocking. When looking into the details of these anomalous measurements, we observe that the HTTP requests consistently failed with a connection reset error.

Furthermore, when comparing the anomalous measurements of May 20 with all the other OONI Probe measurements collected from the testing of those sites in Burundi (prior to May 20), we observe that those social media sites were previously accessible in the country. OONI measurements show that many of these sites were consistently accessible every time they were tested over the last years, and that they only started to present anomalies on May 20. This sudden change – which is evident in the measurements of many social media platforms – strongly suggests that the blocking of these social media websites in Burundi started at around the time of the general election.

The fact that the interference towards these websites only occurs when we attempt to establish an HTTPS connection, as opposed to the IPs being blocked or the DNS queries being interfered with, is a strong indication of some form of Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology being used, perhaps targeting the SNI field of the TLS connection.

Amid Burundi’s general election, OONI data also suggests the blocking of WhatsApp and Telegram.

On May 20, the WhatsApp app was measured on 3 local networks in Burundi: Econet (AS37336), Viettel Burundi (AS327799), and Lacell Burundi (AS327720). Starting at 04:06 UTC on May 20, we observe the blocking of the WhatsApp app on Econet (AS37336). Similarly to the Web Connectivity results (discussed previously), we not only observe the blocking of WhatsApp’s web interface (web.whatsapp.com), but we also see that it presents the exact same connection reset errors. Furthermore, the measurements show that access to the WhatsApp mobile app was blocked as well, since HTTP requests to WhatsApp’s registration service consistently resulted in connection reset errors. As all measurements collected from this network on May 20 consistently show the same failures, they strongly suggest that WhatsApp was blocked in Burundi amid the general election.

Chart: Blocking of WhatsApp in Burundi on May 20 (source: OONI MAT).

Similarly to the testing of WhatsApp, Telegram was tested on 3 local networks in Burundi: Econet (AS37336), Viettel Burundi (AS327799), and Lacell Burundi (AS327720). Starting from 09:42 UTC on May 20, we observe the blocking of Telegram on Econet (AS37336). More specifically, we see that HTTP requests to web.telegram.org result in connection reset errors (similarly to the Web Connectivity testing of web.telegram.org), but HTTP POST requests and TCP connections to the tested Telegram endpoints are successful. All other measurements collected from this network consistently present the same failures, strongly suggesting that Telegram was blocked in Burundi on May 20. Telegram also provided signs of blocking on Viettel Burundi (AS327799), where we observe that HTTP requests to web.telegram.org result in connection reset errors.

Chart: Blocking of Telegram in Burundi on May 20 (source: OONI MAT).

While OONI measurements have been collected from Burundi since 2016, this is the first time that we observed the blocking of social media in the country. It is quite likely the case that internet censorship on the Econet (AS37336) and Viettel Burundi (AS327799) networks was applied through the use of some form of Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology, as the block was not implemented at the DNS or IP level.

Learn more through OONI’s research report.