Isik Mater had just landed on Arlanda and sat on the cellphone. The first message to call was information that the internet had been shut down in Iraqi Nasiriyah.

"The Internet had been shut down for almost the same time as the security forces started firing at the protesters," says Isik Mater at a seminar in central Stockholm.

She is a digital activist from Turkey and one of the people who started and started Netblocks, an organization and network service that maps out interruptions in internet connection around the world.

Internet a human right

This is not the first time Iran has restricted access to the Internet. Typically, for example, pages such as Facebook and Twitter are blocked and accessed only via VPNs. But this is the first time the internet has been restricted to this extent for an entire country, for so many days.

The most common way to digitally censor is to filter and restrict access to certain selected web pages or apps. But now there is a trend that Internet and telecom network shutdowns are becoming more and more common, according to Netblocks.

In 2018, at least 196 incidents were reported in 25 countries, according to a report by the digital rights group Access Now.

- 2019 is not over yet and 35 countries have already shut down the internet this year, says Berhan Taye, senior analyst at Access Now.

A norm in some countries

In Ethiopia, Venezuela and Iraq, Internet disruptions and blocked social media have become a norm, writes IT magazine Wired.

- Since 2018, shutdowns have increased exceptionally. It is almost every week, every day, in one country after another. It is only getting worse and countries are learning from each other, says Isik Mater.

China, with its national internet, has inspired both Russia and Iran, which have been building on similar solutions for several years.

- It stops people in a bubble where you only hear what the authorities want you to hear, says Isik Mater.

Strangling the Internet costs

In addition, extinguishing is very costly, the organizations say.

In Iran, protests were triggered after the regime suddenly and without warning raised the price of gasoline. This money would go to the very poorest households, according to the rulers in Iran. The country is in a difficult financial situation after, among other things, the introduction of tougher sanctions by the United States.

At the same time, Iran's strangulation of the internet is estimated to have cost the country at least US $ 600 million, according to Netblock's estimates. The internet was down for five days, but even though the connection seemed to be coming back, it was so filtered that it was really a ten-day shutdown, says Isik Mater.

"Hard to resist"

Both Access Now and Netblocks believe that the development is alarming and worrying because nothing indicates that this will slow down, on the contrary.

- In several cases, we have seen that if a country shut down the internet once, it is likely to do so again. As soon as they see what power it gives them, they have a very hard time resisting resisting taking the same action again, ”says Berhan Taye.