This content was originally published by Radio Free Asia, and it is now licensed for reprint.
According to a new report released by Freedom House on Wednesday, online rights in Myanmar are now as terrible as in China.
It’s” the first time any nation has ranked as low as China in a decade”, the annual , Freedom on the Net , document says. Nevertheless, digital rights declined for the 14th straight year across the 72 nations reviewed, which covers 87 percent of earth computer users, the party says.
Freedom House blamed a battle by Myanmar’s defense junta , against virtual private networks, or VPNs, as well as standard suppression of virtual appearance as the reasons for its fall to similar previous position.
Both Myanmar and China were awarded a rating of only 9 out 100 in this year’s record. With a rating of 10, Myanmar had just gotten so far that it had to share the last spot with China.
Myanmar’s performance was significantly better ten years ago, with a index of 40 in 2014 as a result of the country’s return to democratic rule in 2012 and 2015. According to Freedom House, its report was even as high as 30 in 2020.
That changed after the military seized energy repeatedly, it says.
Since seizing energy in a 2021 revolution, Myanmar’s military has used a massive censorship and tracking system to defame opponents of their virtual speech, according to the report.
The military “introduced fresh repression technology in May 2024 to prevent most VPNs, preventing people from using tools they could trust to safely and securely circumvent online security,” it continues.
China is still at the bottom of the list.
Also thoroughly at the bottom of the pile of 72 places, though, is China, which made no improvements on its index of 9 next month.
The report attributes Beijing’s persistent efforts to extract China’s domestic web from the rest of the world, blaming the government’s extended impunity for “huge fines on people using VPNs” and its blocking of unusual access to some significant government websites.
” The Chinese authorities even continued to consistently suppress dissent,” it continues,” for instance, by censoring online conversation about activist and journalist Sun Lin, who died in November 2023 after being brutally beaten by police for his social media posts about demonstrations against Chinese Communist Party (CCP ) leader Xi Jinping.”
Ilshat Hassan Kokbore, assistant professional chairman of the World Uyghur Congress, told RFA Uyghur that China’s control of the internet was still the standard-setter, with some places worse than others.
” China’s power of data is the worst, especially in the Uyghur areas. The state has just permitted what the population is allowed to access, according to Kokbore.  ,
He claimed that” the Uyghur locations have already turned into an information black hole.” ” Little comes out from there, other than the government-staged propaganda”.
Liberty hard to find
Vietnam received 26 points, which Freedom House describes as” no free,” and Cambodia received 43, which the organization claims is “partly free” among the other Radio Free Asia goal nations covered by the report.
North Korea’s online is no assessed by the party, but South Korea was awarded a score of 66, even putting it in the “partly free” level.
Across countries covered by RFA’s sister news organization , Benar News, Malaysia and the Philippines (60 ) and Indonesia ( 49 ) were in the “partly free” category, while Bangladesh ( 40 ) and Thailand ( 39 ) were labeled” not free” . ,
The United States, usually considered a pillar of media liberty, was rated 76 out of 100, also considered “free”. The report cites prevalent legal actions against British researchers who publicize “false political information” online as among U. S. failures.
” Individual experts and institutions have reported scaling down their activities and limiting public discussion of their work to avoid similar hostility or hefty legal fees”, the report says, also citing efforts , by Facebook , and X to “hamper” the ability of fact checkers.
The freest internet in the world last year, meanwhile, was in Iceland ( 94 ), closely followed by Estonia (92 ) and Canada and Chile (86 ).
According to the report, Zambia’s ranking increased 3 points to 62 overall, representing the biggest global improvement. The biggest falls took place in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Iraq and Zimbabwe, which all fell 3.