Senegal blocked social media amid political unrest

Amid unrest erupted over the arrest of opposition leader Ousmane Sonko, OONI data from Senegal shows that ISPs started blocking access to several social media platforms on 1st June 2023.

Specifically, OONI data collected from Senegal shows the blocking of WhatsApp, Telegram, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube between 1st to 7th June 2023. While these blocks were lifted by 8th June 2023, Telegram Web remained blocked on Sonatel (AS8346) until 6th August 2023. OONI data also shows that access to TikTok was temporarily blocked in Senegal between 5th to 7th June 2023. In all cases, OONI data shows that the blocks were primarily implemented by means of TLS interference.

The following chart aggregates OONI measurement coverage from the testing of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok domains in Senegal between 10th May 2023 to 30th June 2023.

As is evident, the testing of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube presented anomalies between 1st to 7th June 2023, suggesting that the blocks were lifted by 8th June 2023. The blocking of YouTube is corroborated by the Google Transparency Report, which shows a significant drop in YouTube traffic originating from Senegal during the same period. OONI data also suggests that access to TikTok was temporarily blocked in Senegal between 5th to 7th June 2023. An analysis of OONI data shows that the blocks were implemented by means of TLS interference, suggesting that ISPs in Senegal may have used Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology to implement the blocks.

Similarly, OONI data shows that the testing of WhatsApp presented anomalies between 1st to 7th June 2023, as illustrated below.

OONI data shows that while TCP connections to WhatsApp’s endpoints were successful, the TLS handshakes for WhatsApp Web (web.whatsapp.com) and WhatsApp’s registration service (v.whatsapp.net) timed out.

Unlike WhatsApp, the testing of Telegram did not present anomalies only until 7th June 2023. Instead, we observe that the anomalies spanned until 6th August 2023.

The persistent presence of a relatively large volume of anomalies in the testing of Telegram on 3 different ASNs in Senegal (during the same period) provides a strong indication that, similarly to WhatsApp, access to Telegram was blocked – but unlike WhatsApp, the blocking of Telegram continued after 8th June 2023. Measurements from Saga Africa (AS37649) suggest that access to Telegram was unblocked by mid-July 2023, while measurements from Sudatel Senegal (AS37196) suggest that Telegram was unblocked by 18th July 2023. However, almost all Telegram measurements collected from Sonatel (AS8346) from 1st June 2023 to 6th August 2023 consistently presented anomalies, suggesting that the block lasted longer than on other networks.

Learn more through our research report.