Internet Shutdowns

Algeria

13 June, 2024 07:00 - 10:00 (3 hours)

Local Impact

For a fifth – and presumably final – day, the Algerian government is shutting down the Internet for the entire country during school exams, following the pattern of the last few days. Data from Cloudflare Radar and IODA show that Algeria appears to be following a similar pattern to last year, with a longer outage in the morning and then a second outage in the afternoon. As we noted in our post about exam-related shutdowns in 2024, these Baccalaureate exams go from 9-13 June 2024. We have seen daily shutdowns on each of the days, and today is supposed to be the final day.

In analyzing the data, it appears that the Algerian government is engaging in content blocking whereby the actual Internet connections remain active, but the Internet service providers are ordered to block certain sites, including social media networks and messaging sites.

As we have repeatedly written about here on Pulse, Internet shutdowns cause great harm to a country’s economy and society and are in our opinion not the appropriate mechanism to cope with potential exam cheating

 

Cause Documentation

There has not yet been a formal statement from the government of Algeria. In fact, media reports indicated that the Minister of Education had previously stated that there would not be Internet shutdowns this year’s exams. In a session last week, the Minister of Education outlined the operations for the 2024 Baccalaureate exams and did not mention any form of an Internet shutdown. However, without any warning the Internet was shut down in the similar manner to how the government has shut down Internet access in past years during the exams.

Data and Analysis

Today IODA recorded a drop in Internet traffic in Algeria on 12 June 2024 from 7:00 UTC (8:00 local time) to 10:00 UTC (11:00 local time). We will expect to see a second shutdown again starting at 13:30 UTC (14:30 local time) and going until 15:30 UTC (16:30 local time).

IODA chart showing the first shutdown on June 13

In the chart below you can see the pattern since 9 June.

Chart from IODA showing the two shutdowns each day during school exams.

Similarly the Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI) continues to show problems with WhatsApp messaging on 12 June (this chart will be updated later on 13 June after the second shutdown):

Chart from OONI showing anomalies in WhatsApp connectivity during the exam times.
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