Internet Freedom in Azerbaijan Limited - Freedom House

Washington DC / 14.11.17 / Turan: On November 14, the international human rights organization Freedom House published an annual report on the state of Internet freedom in the world Freedom of the Internet - 2017: Manipulation of Social Media to Undermine Democracy.

As noted in the study, Internet manipulation and disinformation tactics were used in elections in at least 18 countries.

In the last seven years, almost everywhere in the world, there has been a trend of increasing restrictions on the Internet.

The report covers 65 countries and 87 percent of users in the world for the period from June 2016 to May 2017.

In some parts of the report, specific points related to Azerbaijan are touched upon. So, in Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Mexico and China, user accounts in social media were illegally tracked through hacker attacks. Independent Internet experts come to the conclusion that governments are behind these attacks.

The report classifies five types of manipulation on the Internet and four of them were used in Azerbaijan. It"s about using pro-government commentators, pro-government media and "trolls" and also about "stealing" accounts.

At the same time, pluralism in the media of Azerbaijan as a result of the restriction of the activity of the media financed from abroad has seriously worsened.

This situation puts media in a dependent position from the authorities for access to the advertising market.

During the reporting period, news sites were hacked in 18 countries. In Azerbaijan, such an attack happened against the news portal Abzas after it published critical materials about the government. Access to the portal was not restored until it changed the domain.

The examination showed that these attacks were made from IP addresses related to the government of Azerbaijan.

The government of Azerbaijan has been criticized in previous years because of the restriction of Internet freedom and the use of censorship.

Official Baku denies the application of restrictions and declares freedom of the Internet. -16D06-