Guinea blocked social media amid protests

Amid protests against the military junta, Guinea blocked access to numerous social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, YouTube, Snapchat, Telegram) between 17th to 23rd May 2023. In response to the blocks, Access Now published a statement urging authorities in Guinea to unblock access to social media.

The following chart aggregates OONI measurement coverage from the testing of Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube domains in Guinea between 1st to 31st May 2023.

As is evident, these social media websites were found accessible when tested throughout May 2023, only presenting anomalies (signs of blocking) between between 17th to 23rd May 2023. The spike in anomalous measurements for all 4 social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube) during the same period provides a signal of blocking. However, the presence of a few successful measurements between 17th to 23rd May 2023 suggests that access to these social media platforms was not blocked on all tested networks in Guinea.

OONI data suggests that ISPs in Guinea implemented the blocks by means of TLS interference, as OONI data shows that the TLS handshakes resulted in timeout errors. The blocking of YouTube is further corroborated by the Google Transparency Report, which shows a significant drop in YouTube traffic from Guinea during the same period. Yet (quite similarly to OONI data), the continued availability of some (though significantly reduced) YouTube traffic suggests that the block was not implemented on all networks in Guinea.

OONI data also shows that the testing of WhatsApp and Telegram in Guinea presented anomalies between 17th to 23rd May 2023, as illustrated through the following two charts below.

The testing of WhatsApp shows that connections to WhatsApp endpoints were successful, but that access to WhatsApp Web and WhatsApp’s registration services was blocked by means of TLS interference (resulting in timeout errors). OONI data also shows that connections to the tested Telegram endpoints were successful, but that access to Telegram Web was blocked by means of TLS interference. Similarly to the blocking of the aforementioned social media websites, a per-ASN measurement breakdown shows that neither Telegram nor WhatsApp were blocked on all tested networks in Guinea.

Overall, the social media blocks in Guinea between 17th to 23rd May 2023 are primarily observed on Orange Guinee (AS37461) and Areeba Guinee (AS37612). In all cases, OONI data suggests that the social media platforms were blocked by means of TLS interference, and that access was restored by 23rd May 2023. During the same period, OONI data also shows that the testing of Tor presented anomalies, suggesting that ISPs may have attempted to interfere with circumvention efforts.