National shutdown
Internet services were interrupted for 3 hours, from 08:00 to 11:00 local time (UTC +2) on 19 June 2021, for the secondary school exams. Cloudflare observed the largest drop in mobile Internet access. Sudan’s public prosecutor ordered Internet service providers (ISPs) to shut down mobile Internet connections upon the request of the Ministry of Education. This is the second year Sudan has cut off Internet services to prevent students from leaking exam questions. The shutdown sparked public outcry as banking, health, electronic payment, and other services were disrupted during high transaction hours on Sudanese working days.
- Total Duration 2 hours
Sudan
- Population
- 50,448,963
- UN Classification
-
- Least Developed Country
Freedom House rates Internet freedom as Not Free
Local impact
Internet services were interrupted for 3 hours, from 08:00 to 11:00 local time (UTC +2) on 19 June 2021, for the secondary school exams. Cloudflare observed the largest drop in mobile Internet access. Sudan’s public prosecutor ordered Internet service providers (ISPs) to shut down mobile Internet connections upon the request of the Ministry of Education. This is the second year Sudan has cut off Internet services to prevent students from leaking exam questions. The shutdown sparked public outcry as banking, health, electronic payment, and other services were disrupted during high transaction hours on Sudanese working days.
Other supporting information
Following a trend in other Arab countries, Sudan decided to cut off the Internet during the general school examinations. The examinations occur between 19 and 30 June 2021 per the schedule below.
Schedule of Sudan's General Examinations 2021.
Google Traffic over the period
Social media
https://t.co/jlhzpNHo5e pic.twitter.com/7sCwYCLS1v
— Khattab Hamad - خَطَّٰاْبّ (@ga800l) June 21, 2021
Three shutdowns in three days in Sudan.
— Doug Madory (also on Bluesky) (@DougMadory) June 21, 2021
Three shutdowns in a week in Syria.
The scourge of exam-related outages continues. #KeepitOn
(graphics based on @kentikinc data) pic.twitter.com/HqtXv6NLPK
Similar to other countries, #Sudan 🇸🇩 is also implementing daily multi-hour #Internet shutdowns to prevent cheating on national exams. @fastly traffic graphs show the impact of the first three, occurring June 19-21.
— David Belson (@[email protected]) (@dbelson) June 21, 2021
Exam schedule: https://t.co/qlkYxInW72#KeepitOn pic.twitter.com/DPIFN7fy9c