Freedom House: Bahrain is Not Free on the Net (Freedom on the Net Report 2013)
KEY DEVELOPMENTS: MAY 2012 – APRIL 2013
- After an intense government crackdown, more users have begun to exercise a degree of self-censorship when speaking about sensitive issues owing to fears of government reprisals (see Limits on Content).
- Eight online users were given prison sentences during the coverage period, with numerous others arrested or intimidated for Twitter posts amid authorities’ increased intolerance towards government criticism on social media (see Violations of User Rights).
- Cyberattacks and government surveillance were increasingly employed to disrupt or monitor online activities of prominent dissidents (see Violations of User Rights).
INTRODUCTION:
In the absence of a representative government, many Bahrainis look to the internet as an outlet for expressing political, economic, and social frustrations in the country. Unfortunately, as the importance of online tools has grown, so too has the desire of the Bahraini authorities to extend censorship and government repression practices from the real world into the online domain. In 1997, only two years after the internet was introduced in the country, a Bahraini internet user was arrested for the first time after sending information to a political opposition group outside of the country.[1] The Ministry of Information made its first official attempt to block websites containing content critical of the government in 2002, and today over 1,000 websites are blocked, including individual pages on certain social-networking sites.[2]
Crackdowns on Bahraini internet users escalated in 2011, following widespread protests against the ruling family of King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa. The authorities engaged in mass arrests, military trials, torture, and widespread intimidation tactics in an attempt to silence popular demands for greater political rights and democratic freedoms, including a new constitution and an elected government.[3]One online activist died from torture while in police custody in April 2011.[4]
Over the past year, a combined total of over 47 months of prison sentences have been passed down on eight Bahraini citizens as a result of their online activities, while many other cases are pending trial. The continued crackdown and oppressive online environment is pushing more users toward self-censorship. Surveillance of online activity and phone calls is widely practiced, and officers at security checkpoints actively search mobile phones for suspicious content.[5]Numerous users have reportedly been subject to physical or psychological torture while held by authorities, often for Twitter posts. Finally, online activists are subject to consistent cyberattacks as overzealous security forces aim to collect personal information for use during interrogations.
OBSTACLES TO ACCESS:
From a technological perspective, Bahrain is one of the most highly connected countries in the world. In 2012, Bahrain ranked among the top five countries in the Western Asia region on the United Nations Telecommunications Infrastructure Index.[6] Internet access is widely available at schools, universities, shopping malls, and coffee shops, where Bahrainis often gather for work and study.[7] The number of internet users has risen rapidly, from a penetration rate of 28 percent in 2006 to 88 percent in 2012.[8] There are approximately 413,000 internet subscriptions in the country, of which 60 percent were mobile broadband, 28 percent were fixed-wireless, and the remaining were ADSL.[9] Dial-up connections have disappeared since 2010 and ADSL use has declined with the growth of mobile broadband. Approximately 78 percent of broadband subscribers in 2011 were on plans with speeds of at least 1Mbps, while 58 percent enjoyed speeds of 2Mbps or higher.[10] Broadband prices fell by nearly 40 percent between 2010 and 2011, and are among the lowest in the region for mobile broadband. However, prices remain relatively high by international standards[11]and in comparison to countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).[12]
Bahrain also has one of the highest mobile phone penetration rates in the region at 156 percent as of the end of 2012, representing over 2.1 million subscribers.[13]However, in an effort to halt the rapid dissemination of information, authorities banned BlackBerry users from sending news bulletins through text messages in April 2010.[14] BlackBerry phones are popular among young people and the business community and account for around 12.5 percent of mobile subscribers.[15] Similarly, while Web 2.0 applications such as the video-sharing site YouTube, social-networking site Facebook, and the micro-blogging site Twitter are available, the government often blocks individual pages on each of those platforms if they violate the country’s strict laws on political expression. (See “Limits on Content”)
Mobile phone services and ISPs are regulated by the Telecommunications Regulation Authority (TRA) under the 2002 Telecommunications Law. The TRA is responsible for licensing telecommunication providers and for “promoting effective and fair competition among established and new licensed operators.”[16] In this vein, the TRA fined the leading telecommunications company Batelco BHD 5 million (US$13 million) in 2009 for monopolizing access to the country’s international data lines, ordering the company to share its facilities with MENA Telecom and other licensed operators. The TRA has also issued several regulations that have not been welcomed by consumers, including measures that violate individual privacy.[17] (See “Violations of User Rights”)
Although the TRA is theoretically an independent organization, in practice its members are appointed by the government and its chairman reports to the Minister of State for Telecommunications. Up until June 2013, this minister also occupied the post of President of the Information Affairs Authority (IAA).[18] In turn, the IAA, which replaced the Ministry of Information in 2010, oversees both traditional and online media outlets in Bahrain and is responsible for decisions to block websites, which are then enforced by internet service providers (ISPs).
In a positive development, more ISPs have recently been introduced to the Bahraini market, improving Bahrainis’ access to the internet.[19] Indeed, over 31 licenses have been granted since 2003, with 16 providers currently in business.[20] There have been no reported instances of ISPs being denied registration permits. The major providers are Batelco, Zain, MENA Telecom, and VIVA. The latter two are also licensed to provide the increasingly popular WiMAX technology for accessing wireless broadband from one’s computer through a USB device.
Batelco, Zain, and VIVA also serve as Bahrain’s three mobile phone operators. The government has a controlling stake in Bahrain’s largest telecommunications company, Batelco, while other ISPs are owned by investors from the private sector, including non-Bahraini investors. Although there is no centralized internet backbone in Bahrain, all ISPs are indirectly controlled by the government through orders from the TRA. This tight control over the country’s ICT sector has allowed the Bahraini authorities to enforce strict limits on online content.
LIMITS ON CONTENT:
Over the past year, the overall scale and sophistication of censorship has remained stable, with many websites blocked since the February 14, 2011 protests. The popular uprising, which was called for and heavily covered by online channels, resulted in a significant rise of blocking and filtering measures by the Bahraini authorities. Throughout late 2012 and early 2013, prominent platforms for the live-streaming of events and chat applications used to conduct online seminars remained blocked as the government sought to hinder online mobilization through legal and administrative means. The crackdown on online speech has also resulted in an increase in self-censorship among social network users.
The IAA officially blocks websites that violate Articles 19 and 20 of the country’s Press Rules and Regulations. This includes material judged as “instigating hatred of the political regime, encroaching on the state's official religion, breaching ethics, encroaching on religions and jeopardizing public peace or raising issues whose publication is prohibited by the provisions of this law.”[21] As such, any site that criticizes the government, the ruling family, and the country’s status quo is targeted by the IAA and promptly blocked. According to statistics provided by an online community-based survey, 39 percent of all sites reportedly blocked in Bahrain are related to politics, while 24 percent are related to the use of various internet tools, such as anonymizers and web proxies.[22] According to some estimates, the IAA has blocked or shut down more than 1,000 websites, including human rights websites, blogs, online forums, and individual pages from social media networks.[23] For example, the websites of the Arab Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) and the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR) have been blocked since 2006. The website of the opposition Bahrain Justice and Development Movement, which was established abroad, has been blocked since 2011.[24]
Although there are a number of news websites providing a plurality of viewpoints distinct from the narrative of Bahraini state media, most of these are blocked by the government and require circumvention tools to access. The websites of international television channels that continue to report on the unrest in Bahrain, such as Al-Alam,[25] Press TV,[26] and Lualua TV, remain blocked.[27] The news site Bahrainmirror.com, which is published from abroad,[28] and the website of the London-based Al-Qudus Al-Arabi newspaper have been blocked since 2011 for publishing views that are critical to the Bahraini government.[29]Bahrainonline.org, the country’s prominent online forum, has been blocked since its launch in 1998, though its moderators have continuously generated and distributed new links to bypass the block.[30] The Arabic web portal and blog-hosting service Al-Bawaba has also been blocked since 2006. Online newspapers have been banned from using audio and video reports on their websites since 2010, apart from the state-owned Bna.bh, which publishes video reports taken from state television.[31] Website administrators face the same libel laws that apply to print journalists and are held jointly responsible for all content posted on their sites or chat rooms.
YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and international blog-hosting services are freely available. However, certain Web 2.0 tools are permanently blocked and specific content on social networks can be inaccessible. For example, since February 2011, most live-broadcasting websites[32] that were popular among protesters have been blocked.[33] PalTalk, a chatting service that was used to conduct political seminars for wide online audiences, has been blocked since June 2011.[34] In September 2012, authorities briefly blocked the United Nations broadcast website in anticipation of the Bahrain Universal Periodic Review session.[35] It was unblocked shortly after, following a large online pressure campaign. A crowdsourcing application implemented by a Bahraini blogger used to track the locations of flash security checkpoints was blocked a few days after its launch in August 2012.[36] Furthermore, all websites displaying the “abusive video of Prophet Mohamed” were blocked after an order from the Ministry of Interior in September 2012.[37] Although the video was officially blocked, it remained accessible using certain mobile phone applications.
Following the March 2011 crackdown on protestors, authorities also used extralegal measures to forcibly remove online content. Through the use of arrests,[38] detentions, and torture,[39] security forces coerced many online forum moderators into permanently shutting down their sites.[40] This resulted in the loss of a large amount of information on Bahrain’s history that had been documented by online users and made available only through local forums and websites.
In Bahrain, websites are filtered based on keyword density, the manual entry of URLs, and certain website categories. An updated list of blocked websites is regularly sent to ISPs, which are instructed to “prohibit any means that allow access to sites blocked by the ministry.”[41] Through notification to the TRA, the IAA can revoke the license of any operator that does not cooperate with its blocking orders.[42] Batelco, Bahrain’s main ISP, filters the web using McAfee SmartFilter software and Blue Coat technology.[43] In March 2011, plans were announced to switch to technology from Palo Alto Networks that can block certain elements and activities within websites, such as video or photo uploading, and make it more difficult for users to circumvent censorship.
The decision-making process and government policies behind the blocking of websites are not transparent. The list of all blocked websites is not available to the public and the IAA can order the blocking of a website without referring the case to a court. In addition, webmasters do not receive notifications or explanations when their websites are banned. When trying to access a blocked site, users are presented with the message, “This web site has been blocked for violating regulations and laws of Kingdom of Bahrain,” with no particular laws specified. Although the law does technically allow affected individuals to appeal a block within 15 days, no such case has yet been adjudicated.
The government crackdown in March 2011 led many regular internet users to exercise a higher degree of self-censorship, particularly after investigations of users’ online activities were launched at work places and universities.[44] Today, the majority of users on Twitter and online forums, and even those who leave comments on online editions of newspapers, still use pseudonyms over fears of being targeted by the authorities.[45] Many have modified their privacy settings on social media or ‘protected’ their Twitter pages. There has been a drop in the level of tweets related to the #Bahrain hashtag since November 2012, following the prosecution of four internet users.[46] Some Twitter users have even announced that they have been temporarily forced to stop tweeting after receiving threats to their personal safety.[47]
While websites that express criticism of the government are blocked, authorities also manipulate the online content that is accessible in order to fabricate greater public support. Hoax journalists[48] linked to public relations (PR) agencies have been employed by the government to spread propaganda on Twitter and progovernment blogs such as BahrainViews and Bahrain Independent.[49] At least one agency was contracted to provide “web optimization and blogging” services to the Bahraini government,[50] while other PR agencies are known to have been contracted for online reputation management through the creation of