The Unfreedom Monitor: A Methodology for Tracking Digital Authoritarianism Around the World

"Digital communications technologies have been a powerful tool in the advancement of democratic governance, but in recent years there is concern that they are being used to undermine democracy as well."

This briefing report, published under Global Voices' Advox project's Unfreedom Monitor initiative, seeks to deepen our understanding of the motivation, dynamics, and possible future directions of digital authoritarianism globally. The objective of the Unfreedom Monitor project is to analyse, document, and report on the growing phenomenon of the use of digital communications technology to advance authoritarian governance, with the initial phase of the project consisting of tracking and documenting key developments in digital authoritarianism in selected countries. This briefing document shares some of the findings from eleven countries, while explaining the theoretical framework and methodology behind the project. The ultimate objective is to develop a diagnostic method that can be deployed across political contexts to help observers and analysts anticipate the emergence of authoritarian practices and respond to them properly.

As explained in the executive summary, "'Digital authoritarianism' describes the use of technology to advance repressive political interests. It is not purely confined to authoritarian regimes. Democratic states have also used and sold advanced technology to track and/or surveil citizens, spread mis/disinformation and disempower citizens' civic and political participation. Nor is it only states that perpetrate digital authoritarianism. In fact, corporations located in democratic countries are key suppliers of the technology that is used. The growth of digital authoritarianism highlights an important paradox: the internet, seen in its early days as a utopian project that promoted civic and political participation, can also be used as a tool to quash the same behaviour that it can help foster. By understanding authoritarianism as a process rather than an event, and by focusing on political choices that exacerbate this process, we can deepen our understanding of how technology impacts human rights. This is especially relevant in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and how technology that was built to stem the spread of the virus also provided considerable surveillance power to the state."

The Unfreedom Monitor combines the methodology used in Global Voices' previous work on media observatories with an in-depth analysis of the contextual issues around digital authoritarianism. The previous work under the Civic Media Observatory (see Related Summaries, below) is a qualitative study of a dataset consisting of media items exploring issues, events, actors, media frames, and responses to identify trends and patterns of digital authoritarianism. To complement this dataset, the key research question for the Unfreedom Monitor is: "What are the key motives for, methods of, and responses to, digital authoritarianism in selected national contexts?" This question is further broken down into the following subquestions:

1. Motives

a. What are the contexts that inspire authoritarians to clamp down on digital spaces?

b. What are the immediate triggers of an expansion in digital authoritarianism?

c. How do regional and international organisations affect how governments behave in relation to digital authoritarianism?

2. Methods

a. What are the key technologies used in advancing digital authoritarianism?

b. What are the key mechanisms - legal, economic, etc. - through which these technologies are acquired and deployed?

c. What role does money play in the choice of technologies?

3. Responses

a. How do the citizens of the countries under investigation respond to the expansion of digital authoritarianism?

b. How do other governments in the region and the international community respond to the expansion of digital authoritarianism?

The sample of eleven countries in this study was chosen to reflect a variety of types of government, corporate relations, and approaches to human rights. These countries are: Brazil, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Morocco, Myanmar, Russia, Sudan, Tanzania, Turkey, and Zimbabwe. The report analyses the government structures, key political events, and digital authoritarian practices in each country and categorises the actions related to digital authoritarianism into the following categories: internet controls, surveillance, information manipulation, technology controls, freedom restrictions, and systems attacks.

Based on the analysis of data from the eleven countries, the report further identifies and highlights some of the cross-cutting themes in digital authoritarianism to aid in developing an approach that can be used across various national and political contexts. The themes, as outlined in the executive summary, are as follows:

1. Data governance is a major cross-cutting theme that concerns practices like surveillance and data privacy. In fact, surveillance is the practice of digital authoritarianism most likely to emerge in countries, regardless of whether they are considered a democratic or autocratic state, and many surveillance companies are based in economically advanced countries that would be considered democratic. Many of the countries in this study have been linked to purchases of malware and other cyber-surveillance weapons, such as NSO Group's Pegasus software. Contract tracing apps for COVID-19 (such as India's Arogya Setu), national registration and systems, and the use of facial recognition and artificial intelligence (AI)-powered closed-circuit television (CCTV).
2. Constraining freedom of expression and curbing speech is an important aspect of digital authoritarianism. In countries like Ecuador, Morocco, Russia, and Turkey, media laws have placed heavy penalties on freedom of expression, especially in the online sphere. With the changing landscape of information-sharing, many of them don't apply to just journalists but also netizens, including social media influencers. In Egypt, for example, 500 websites have been blocked since 2017, and social media policing is widespread. Moroccans have been prosecuted for the content of their Facebook posts under the country's harsh media laws.
3. If users do not have access to the internet, their ability to engage in civic and political discourse is drastically reduced. Governments have done exactly that during times of upheaval or strong dissent (e.g., the Myanmar coup, during citizen protests in India, and in the run-up to elections in Tanzania). This stifles the free flow of information and is very costly.
4. States and government-affiliated bodies have also been identified as controlling the flow of information, by perpetrating large-scale disinformation campaigns as a way of promoting digital authoritarianism. In Brazil, Jair Bolsanaro is linked to a government-funded "digital militia" that has spread false news about COVID-19-related topics. Influencers have been paid to spread unverified information. In India, Prime Minister Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) party have long used their social media presence to promote their brand, with BJP-linked accounts trolling religious and political minorities.

In conclusion, the report finds that "digital authoritarianism is not confined to authoritarian states. Rather, it is a culture - of increasing executive power, legislation and global capital flows - that allows the state to interfere in citizens' lives and to stifle or frustrate civic engagement. There is no single predictive factor, but digital authoritarianism is closely related to the contraction of press freedom. Moreover, it is a transnational process, and the availability of technology in one part of the world will eventually have political consequences in another."