Ukraine war
Internet blockades cost Russia $1.2 billion
Amazon has suspended its services in Russia
© Soren Stache / DPA
Network blockades are a popular means of authoritarian regimes to stifle critical voices. However, these are also associated with high costs for the respective country, as the infographic from Statista shows.
Throttling and subsequent blocking of access to certain social media services and news sites has cost Russia an estimated $1.2 billion this year. This is the result of an analysis by the VPN comparison portal Top 10 VPN. As the statistaThe graphic shows that in 2022 there will be no other country in the world that will have incurred anywhere near as high costs.
This high amount can be explained by the number of people affected: around 113 million people were unable to access the relevant services for more than 500 hours. Kazakhstan ranks second in Top 10 VPN with a cost of $430 million.
Longest shutdowns in Myanmar
The Central Asian state restricted its citizens’ access to internet services amid protests over rising fuel prices earlier this year. By far the longest-lasting shutdowns have so far taken place in Myanmar. The restrictions have lasted around 3,800 hours for around 1.6 million Internet users, especially in Chin State in the west of the country, which explains the lower costs of 198 million US dollars despite the longer duration.
The rest of the top 5 is occupied by two African countries. Twitter was recently unbanned in Nigeria, but it has cost US$100 million to get to that point. To date, the shutdown of selected Internet services in Ethiopia has cost US$30 million and lasted nearly 2,000 hours. Here too, the geographic limitation was responsible for the comparatively low level of costs, since the restrictions were concentrated on the civil war-torn Tigray region.