Internet services restricted in Venezuela amid uprising

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Network data shows that Venezuela’s state-run internet provider ABA CANTV (AS8048) has restricted access to Twitter, Periscope, YouTube, Facebook and several other services after Juan Guaidó used Twitter to announce the final phase of Operation Freedom from the perimeter of a military base in La Carlota. The project, which has reportedly gained the support of defectors from the military, has the stated goal of reinstating democratic establishments in Venezuela.

Access to each of the services remains intermittently available as the restrictions do not appear to be 100% effective, matching the patterns of network outage observed in previous nationwide censorship incidents.

With WhatsApp servers already unstable, Telegram messenger’s web interface and website have become fully unreachable for users of Venezuela’s state-run internet provider as of 21:00 UTC (17:00 VET). The two applications have been used extensively by Venezuelans to keep track of the situation in the country. Telegram includes blocking countermeasures which can allow the mobile version of the app to continue working:

Internet access was finally restored towards the end of Tuesday, 20 minutes prior to a live-streamed speech by Nicolás Maduro:

Network data clearly shows the restoration of Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and messaging applications 20 minutes prior to a scheduled live-streamed speech by Nicolás Maduro, after a day of targeted internet disruptions

 

The outages mark a sudden escalation of internet censorship imposed by the state appearing to target critical speech. Data are consistent with previous targeted disruptions during public appearances by Juan Guaidó, and during sessions of Venezuela’s National Assembly.

Past incidents of network filtering in Venezuela have lasted from twelve minutes to over twenty hours, when YouTube was restricted hours before the country’s first nationwide power outage. Network data indicates that the platform disruptions are consistent with methods used to block online content in Venezuela.

However, the extent of blocking through Tuesday is unprecedented in NetBlocks’ archive of network disruption incidents in Venezuela.

Methodology

Internet performance and service reachability are determined via NetBlocks web probe privacy-preserving analytics. Each measurement consists of latency round trip time, outage type and autonomous system number aggregated in real-time to assess service availability and latency in a given country. Network providers and locations are enumerated as vantage point pairs. The root cause of a service outage may be additionally corroborated by means of traffic analysis and manual testing as detailed in the report.

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