The year Pakistan’s internet users crossed 90 million with a broadband penetration of 42.2pc, the government led consistent efforts to regulate the online experience of consumers. Courtesy MIT Tech Review Pakistan
AARHUS (Denmark): The year Pakistan’s internet users crossed 90 million with a broadband penetration of 42.2pc, the government led consistent efforts to regulate the online experience of consumers.
According to the annual report for 2020 released by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), the country’s digital economy has grown enormously during the pandemic as more people are using the internet.
Broadband subscriptions showed growth trends of 17pc during FY2020, crossing the 90.1 million in October 2020 mark whereas 4G subscriptions registered an exponential 60pc growth (FY2020). With the expansion of 3G and 4G services, FY2020 also marked an increase of 77pc in data usage.
Continued social media shutdown hurts business
February 1, 2021 Written by Zurah Nakabugo
When government shut down internet on January 13, the eve of the presidential and parliamentary elections, the reasoning was to prevent its misuse that might bring about chaos and disorder.
Government said it switched off the internet to prevent some people, especially in the opposition, from causing insecurity in the country. It insists that some of them are harbouring these ideas and have openly made the threats. That shutdown was lifted January 18 and according to various reports, the economy is estimated to have lost about Shs 700 billion in those six days.
According to Bursa Malaysia-listed Systech Bhd chief executive officer Raymond Tan, (pic) businesses remained cautious at the start of the movement control order (MCO) which started last March. AMID the Covid-19 pandemic, fresh worries about cyber security are piling on even as more and more people go online for work and to do simple everyday things like banking and grocery shopping.
In fact, according to reports this week, Malaysia recently received warnings that government websites would be hacked amid claims that the security systems in the country were loose, and therefore vulnerable to hackers
.In the working world, with a sudden spike in people working remotely and accessing Virtual Private Networks or VPNs from anywhere and at anytime, the risks for external parties to gain access to private information has increased by leaps and bounds.
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IT emerged on January 26 that a higher-up in the Buhari regime has instructed Nigeria’s major telecommunications companies MTN, Glo, Airtel, 9mobile, etc. to block access to the website of the Peoples Gazette, an up-and-coming, uncompromisingly hard-hitting, evidence-based, digital-native investigative news reporting outfit headquartered in Abuja.
The news site is reminiscent of the advocatorial, muckraking editorial temperaments of the New York-based Sahara Reporters in its earliest incarnation. Peoples Gazette has published PDFs of the illicit financial transactions of Nigeria’s morally decadent political elites and has broken several exclusive, consequential stories that have shaped national discourse. And the paperstarted publishing only on September 25, 2020, that is, just a little over four months ago.
Amid censorship in Venezuela, neighborhood reporters rely on loudspeakers, posters
Cody Weddle, Colombia/Venezuela Correspondent
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BOGOTA, Colombia – The perils of the truth during authoritarian rule are forcing Venezuelans to adapt and improvise. Community journalists are relying on loudspeakers to deliver local news that the neighborhood can use.
From a balcony in Caracas’ La Cruz neighborhood, Dario Chacon, a The Bus TV reporter, read the second news bulletin of the year written by Marilyn Figuera.
The news bulletin reminded neighbors that they will be reporting the local results of COVID-19 tests via text message. Chacon and Figuera have been doing community service for more than a year.