Uganda Said It Would Ban VPNs To Prevent Users From Dodging Its Absurd New Social Media Tax: Guess How That Worked Out?

from the OK,-we'll-just-tax-everything-instead dept

Three years ago we wrote about African countries that thought taxing blogs and social media was an easy way to raise money -- and to muzzle inconvenient voices. A year later, Techdirt was reporting on a sudden boom in VPN use among Ugandans keen to avoid that country's levy on social media use. As Karl Bode reported, back then the authorities were pressuring ISPs to ban the use of VPNs. A post on the Rest of the World site has a useful update on how things have worked out since then. First, the money:

after three years, the tax, which amounts to about 5 cents (200 Ugandan shillings) per day to access any of more than 60 social media platforms, has failed. It has neither helped the government raise significant revenue nor curtailed lively online discussions by young Ugandans.

In its first fiscal year, the Ugandan government was projected to collect about $77.8 million (248 billion Ugandan shillings) from social media tax. Instead, it raised only about $13.5 million (49.5 billion shillings). In the next fiscal year, Uganda lowered its expectations and projected to collect $16.5 million but only just slightly beat its target by raising $18.7 million.

The reason, as expected, is that people are turning to VPNs, often the free ones, despite the intrusive pop-up ads and questionable security. It turns out that it's harder to ban VPNs than the government thought. So the Ugandan authorities have come up with Plan B:

Thanks to VPNs users have found a way around the social media tax. That's why, on April 29, the government replaced the social media tax with a 12% excise duty on internet data that will likely hike the cost of internet access in the landlocked country that already has some of the highest internet costs in the region.

The idea here is presumably that even if people use VPNs, they will have to pay the data tax. That will probably work, but the move brings with it a huge problem. It will make using the Internet for any purpose in Uganda more expensive, which will not only discourage ordinary people from taking advantage of it, but will also throttle Ugandan online startups. However much the new tax brings in, it is likely to be far less than the deeper economic harm this short-sighted move will inflict.

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Filed Under: blogs, commentary, free speech, internet taxes, social media, uganda, vpns

Huawei Busted Helping African Governments Spy On The Press, Political Opponents

from the ill-communication dept

While the Trump administration's war on Huawei may be largely fueled by evidence optional protectionism, that certainly doesn't mean Huawei is an ethical company. Like any good telecom and networking giant, it can routinely be found helping governments engage in behavior that's less than, say, moral. For example a damning report emerged this week in the Wall Street Journal (paywall, here's a non-paywalled video report and a fairly decent alternative take) showcasing how Huawei technicians have helped African leaders intercept encrypted transmissions of their political opponents:

"Technicians from the Chinese powerhouse have, in at least two cases, personally helped African governments spy on their political opponents, including intercepting their encrypted communications and social media, and using cell data to track their whereabouts, according to senior security officials working directly with the Huawei employees in these countries.

Yeah, gross. The "help" included helping government officials gain access to protected WhatsApp data from political opponents, which was then used against them:

"The Huawei engineers, identified by name in internal police documents reviewed by the Journal, used the Israeli-made spyware to penetrate Mr. Wine’s WhatsApp chat group, named Firebase crew after his band. Authorities scuppered his plans to organize street rallies and arrested the politician and dozens of his supporters."

Granted, the investigation did not turn up evidence that this spying was occurring on behalf of Beijing, or replicated in other countries like the US. Nor did it indicate that any kind of intentional flaw or backdoor in Huawei gear was used to gain access to this confidential data (the cornerstone of the effort to ban Huawei from international networks). But the report does a great job showing how most telecoms are happy to throw ethics in the toilet if it means cozying up to governments when it's profitable to do so.

In this case, Huawei's "help" even included helping African governments access the phones and Facebook pages of bloggers running a pro-opposition news site that had been previously critical of the government. The fusion of telecoms and law enforcement is obviously of particular note when that fusion results in attacks on the press, usually disguised as something else. Enter that ever-menacing but nebulously defined villain known as "fake news":

Zambia’s ruling party spokesman, Antonio Mwanza, said Huawei technicians, based inside the Zambia Information & Communications Technology Authority, or Zicta, regulator, were helping the government combat opposition news sites.

“Whenever we want to track down perpetrators of fake news, we ask Zicta, which is the lead agency. They work with Huawei to ensure that people don’t use our telecommunications space to spread fake news,” he said. Ugandan officials said that Huawei representatives have stopped attending technical briefings since the Journal submitted questions to the Chinese company. China’s Foreign Ministry said in a written statement that it is common practice for countries to cooperate on policing. “Some African countries have enthusiastically built ‘safe cities’ in order to improve the lives of their people and their business environments,” the ministry said. “To equate this positive effort with ‘surveillance’ smacks of ulterior motives.”

That said, none of this is historically unique. Telecoms are, again, routinely grafted to governments, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies in problematic ways. Just ask AT&T, who is so tightly wired to the NSA, you can't tell where the telco ends and the government begins. Similarly the US has a long history of partnering with companies to provide IT support and telecoms gear to a huge variety of dictators who then utilized that technology to help track and kill political opponents, dissidents, and even students. The press and public moral indignation at this kind of behavior tends to be... inconsistent and colored by patriotism.

And while Huawei is clearly not ethical, you'd be hard pressed to find a telecom giant that is. The US blackballing of Huawei is still based on a lot of unproven allegations of wholesale spying on Americans at China's behest, something that would drive (and has driven) US companies bat-shit crazy when the shoe is on the other foot. And while the US war on Huawei is partially based on some genuine security concerns, it's also heavily driven by a protectionist bid by companies like Cisco that simply don't want to have to compete with cheaper Chinese kit. The exact percentage breakdown of this equation has yet to be seen.

Filed Under: africa, authoritarian governments, china, freedom of the press, political opponents, surveillance, uganda, zambia
Companies: huawei

Surprise: Uganda's New Social Media Tax Seems To Have Led To Fewer People Using The Internet, And Total Value Of Mobile Transactions To Drop

from the how-to-hobble-a-nascent-digital-economy-in-one-easy-move dept

Techdirt has been following the regrettable story of African governments imposing taxes and levies on Internet use. For example, Uganda has added a daily fee of 200 Ugandan shillings ($0.05) that its citizens must pay to access social media sites and many common Internet-based messaging and voice applications (collectively known as "OTT services"). It has also imposed a tax on mobile money transactions. When people started turning to VPNs as a way to avoid these charges, the government tried to get ISPs to ban VPN use. As we pointed out, these kind of taxes could discourage the very people who could benefit the most from using the Internet. And in news that will surprise no one, so it has turned out, according to official data from the Uganda Communications Commission, summarized here by an article on the Quartz site:

In the three months following the introduction of the levy in July 2018, there was a noted decline in the number of internet users, total revenues collected, as well as mobile money transactions. In a series of tweets, the Uganda Communications Commission noted internet subscription declined by more than 2.5 million users, while the sum of taxpayers from over-the-top (OTT) media services decreased by more than 1.2 million users. The value of mobile money transactions also fell by 4.5 trillion Ugandan shillings ($1.2 million).

Given the timing, it seems likely that it was indeed the newly-introduced levy that caused the number of Internet users in Uganda to drop dramatically, and the mobile phone-based economy to contract. Neither is good for the people of Uganda, its economy or its government. It's clearly time for the Ugandan authorities to rescind the tax before too much long-term damage is caused -- and for other African nations with ill-advised Internet levies to do the same.

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Filed Under: internet, internet tax, social media, uganda

African Countries Shooting Themselves In The Digital Foot By Imposing Taxes And Levies On Internet Use

from the how-not-to-do-it dept

Techdirt has written a number of stories recently about unfortunate developments taking place in the African digital world. The Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI ) site has usefully pulled together what's been happening across the continent -- and it doesn't look good:

A4AI's recent mobile broadband pricing update shows that Africans face the highest cost to connect to the internet -- just 1GB of mobile data costs the average user in Africa nearly 9% of their monthly income, while their counterparts in the Asia-Pacific region pay one-fifth of that price (around 1.5% of monthly income). Despite this already high cost to connect, we're seeing a worrying trend of governments across Africa imposing a variety of taxes on some of the most popular internet applications and services.

The article goes on to list the following examples.

Uganda

imposes a daily fee of UGX 200 ($0.05) to access social media sites and many common Internet-based messaging and voice applications, as well as a tax on mobile money transactions.

Zambia

has announced it will levy a 30 ngwee ($0.03) daily tax on social network use.

Tanzania

requires bloggers to pay a government license fee roughly equivalent to the average annual income for the country.

Kenya

aims to impose additional taxation on the Internet, with proposed levies on telecommunications and on mobile money transfers.

Benin

imposed a 5 CFCA ($0.01) per megabyte fee to access social media sites, messaging, and Voice-over-IP applications, causing a 250% increase in the price for 1GB of mobile data.

The article explains that the last of these was rescinded within days because of public pressure, while Kenya's tax is currently on hold thanks to a court order. Nonetheless, there is a clear tendency among some African governments to see the Internet as a handy new source of tax income. That's clearly a very short-sighted move. At a time when the digital world in Africa is advancing rapidly, with innovation hubs and startups appearing all over the continent, making it more expensive and thus harder for ordinary people to access the Internet threatens to throttle this growth. Whatever the short-term benefits from the moves listed above, countries imposing taxes and levies of whatever kind risk cutting their citizens off from the exciting digital future being forged elsewhere in Africa. As the A4AI post rightly says:

Africa, with the largest digital divide of any geographic region, has the greatest untapped potential with regards to improving affordable access and meaningful use of the internet. With affordable internet access, African economies can grow sustainably and inclusively.

Sadly, in certain African countries, that seems unlikely to happen.

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Filed Under: africa, benin, censorship, fees, internet, internet access, kenya, levies, social media, tanzania, taxes, uganda, zambia

Want To Blog In Tanzania, Or Read Social Media In Uganda? Pay The Government, Please

from the consequences-of-lugambo dept

Although blogging may have lost its early excitement for many, in some countries it still represents a vital channel for news that may not be available elsewhere. For example, as Global Voices explains:

Blogging emerged in Tanzania around 2007 and became popular as an alternative news platform with educated, middle class people, as well as politicians and political parties. In Tanzania, where media historically holds strong ties to government interests, blogging opened up possibilities for individuals to establish private news outlets that proved immensely powerful in terms of reach and readership.

The current Tanzanian government is not very happy about this uncontrolled flow of information to the people. But instead of anything so crude as shutting down blogs directly, it has come up with a more subtle, but no less effective, approach:

On March 16, 2018, the United Republic of Tanzania issued the Electronic and Postal Communications (Online Content) Regulations demanding that bloggers must register and pay over USD $900 per year to publish online.

To put that in context, Tanzania's GDP per capita was under $900 in 2016, so the new fees are completely out of reach for the majority of people in the country. As Quartz notes, in addition, the registration process is onerous, and the fines for infringement serious:

applicants are expected to fill a form detailing the estimated cost of investment, the number of directors and stakeholders in the platform, their share of capital, staff qualifications, expected dates of commencing operations, besides future growth plans.

But even after providing this documentation, authorities still reserve the right to revoke a permit if a site publishes content that "causes annoyance, threatens harm or evil, encourages or incites crimes" or jeopardizes "national security or public health and safety." Officials could also force managers to remove "prohibited content" within 12 hours or face fines not less than five million shillings ($2,210) or a year in prison.

The situation is slightly easier in Tanzania's northern neighbor, Uganda. Under a new order there (pdf), "All online data communication service providers, including online publishers, online news platforms, online radio and television operators" are required to register with the Uganda Communications Commission. However, there's no mention of fees, or punishments for non-compliance. But if life for Ugandan bloggers seems to be easier than for those in Tanzania, a new daily tax on social media is designed to discourage ordinary users from engaging in what Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni calls "lugambo", or gossip, online. A report in the local Daily Monitor newspaper quotes the President as saying:

"I am not going to propose a tax on internet use for educational, research or reference purposes... these must remain free. However, olugambo on social media (opinions, prejudices, insults, friendly chats) and advertisements by Google and I do not know who else must pay tax because we need resources to cope with the consequences of their lugambo"

The amount of the daily tax is not clear -- a BBC report on the move says it might be either 100 or 200 Ugandan shillings ($0.013 or $0.027) a day -- and there are no details yet on how the new law will be enforced and the taxes collected for services deemed to involve "gossip". But as another Global Voices post notes, this social media tax is just the latest clampdown on the online world in Uganda. It quotes a January 2018 report from Unwanted Witness, a Ugandan NGO, which said:

2017 registered the highest number of Ugandans ever arrested for their online expression and these arrests are clearly targeted crackdown on free flow of information and speech on the Internet.

Different as they are, what the moves in Tanzania and Uganda both show is African governments coming up with new ways to muzzle online commentators that seek to tell people what the official media don't.

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Filed Under: blogging, free speech, internet, regulations, social media, tanzania, taxation, uganda

Ugandan Government Obtains Mysterious, South Korean-Built Anti-Porn Machine

from the world-looks-on-in-partially-horrified-bemusement dept

At long last, Uganda's anti-porn "machine" has arrived. As The Next Web notes, the country's government placed an order for a porn-blocking machine last year, following on the heels of yet another anti-porn law. A company in South Korea has helpfully cobbled this together and presumably the Ugandan government will be deploying it shortly.

How does it work? No one knows for sure, possibly not even those in the government who spent $88,000 for it. TechZim has a theory.

The machine will detect pornographic pictures, videos or graphics taken or saved on phones, computers or cameras. Quite the super machine it seems. The minister did not however give details of exactly how the machine works, which makes sense as the machine will probably work better if people do not know exactly how and what it looks for.

How does the pornography detection machine work though? This machine is not the first attempt at detecting porn on devices. There are several products already available, the Paraben Porn Detection Stick being an example. The Stick uses advanced image analysing algorithms to identify facial features, flesh tones and body parts that are potentially pornographic among other things.

The Stick actually works to a certain extent. It errs on the side of over-zealousness as it flags normal photos as pornographic more frequently than the opposite. The Stick however only scans for images and not videos which are harder to scan. Uganda’s machine does both, which it should at $88,000 because the Paraben Porn Detection Stick costs around $129.

Why does it even exist? Well, one reason a porn-detecting machine might be put in place is to generate revenue, turning easy busts of easy bust-oglers into easy cash. Users caught looking at porn face steep fines (up to $3,000) and imprisonment. Another revenue stream would be helpful since the country's government is pretty much insolvent, even before shelling out $88,000 for a machine that might not actually do what the government thinks it will.

But it's not just about the revenue. There are other issues at play. On the surface, making porn illegal makes fiscal sense, thanks to the nation's cellphone users being tied to their SIM cards via government mandate. Other devices will remain relatively unsurveilled, but it's assumed the government's anti-porn committee will be pushing the nation's internet service providers to route their traffic through its anti-porn machine.

Rev. Fr. Simon Rokodo heads the government's ethics committee and has offered up an explanation of sorts for the technology's existence and deployment -- one that sounds like a statement from the Westboro Baptist Church.

We are going to attack and attack. I have fresh tactics. One of them is a censor gadget or machine. We are going to procure this machine and it will detect homos and porn actors, especially those misusing applications like Whatsapp with sex acts. The South Koreans are programming it. And very soon we will ship it into the country and all the evil will be busted.

This is a very cheery prognosis for a machine likely to develop a false positive problem, if it isn't defeated by quick and dirty workarounds immediately after deployment. And try as he might, Rokodo's anti-XXX-box isn't going to stand in the way of encrypted messages. Of course, the endgame might include banning encrypted messaging services and letting some form of deep packet inspection loose citizens' communications under the guise of running a superficially-clean country.

But once the government has become the censorious man-in-the-middle, all sorts of nasty things can happen. Criticism of the government might suddenly vanish along with the critics. Other entertainment sources not directly approved by the Rev might become inaccessible. Dissidents, journalists, and others with prior reason to fear their government might have their communications exposed. This may be the real endgame, with porn being the wedge. iAfrikan notes the machine reportedly traces VPN and Tor connections, which would allow it to block access to those seeking to keep their internet activity out of the government's hands.

Local reactions have ranged from outrage to ridicule with a few puritanical supporters speaking up for the government's plan to intercede on their behalf by making moral judgments calls for the entirety of the nation. Whatever it is Uganda is actually putting in place isn't just about porn. It's about government control of communications and access to information. It may be wearing a borrowed halo at the moment, but it's only a matter of time before mission creep sets in.

Filed Under: internet, porn, south korea, uganda, wtf

Ugandan Composer Wants Royalties For The National Anthem

from the welcome-to-ownership-culture dept

One of the unfortunate byproducts of a culture that teaches us that something like a song can be "owned" and that each time it's played the "owner" needs to get paid, is you end up with situations like the following one, where the composer of Uganda's national anthem is suing the government for copyright infringement, claiming it owes him royalties for every time the song has been played by the government. Without knowing the details of Ugandan copyright law, there's a bit of a problem in that it appears the government did pay him (not very much) initially for composing the song, which would suggest that it was a work for hire, and he shouldn't have retained the copyright. However, from the sound of things, that wasn't particularly explicit. Either way, it sounds like cold hard cash outweighs national pride -- though, it is odd that the guy waited 45 years before suddenly realizing that he should get paid.

Filed Under: copyright, national anthem, royalties, uganda