FREEDOM HOUSE Freedom on the Net 2012 1 SAUDI ARABIA 2011 2012 Not Not POPULATION: 29 million INTERNET FREEDOM STATUS Free Free INTERNET PENETRATION 2011: 48 percent Obstacles to Access (0-25) 14 14 WEB 2.0 APPLICATIONS BLOCKED: No NOTABLE POLITICAL CENSORSHIP: Yes Limits on Content (0-35) 27 26 BLOGGERS/ICT USERS ARRESTED: Yes Violations of User Rights (0-40) 29 31 PRESS FREEDOM STATUS: Not Free Total (0-100) 70 71 * 0=most free, 100=least free INTRODUCTION While the recent wave of protests and demonstrations in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has not changed the political landscape in the country as in other Arab countries such as Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, the internet freedom landscape in the Kingdom has no doubt changed considerably over the past year. Inspired by the Arab Spring events in 2011, millions of people in Saudi Arabia flooded social media sites such as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, and hundreds, if not thousands, participated in political campaigns to demand political, social, and economic reforms, fostering the emergence of innumerable political activists on social media. However, as soon as Saudis went online to express their opinions, demand actions, and organize demonstrations, the Saudi government took immediate steps to respond to what it regarded as a national security threat. The government issued warnings banning protests, reminded people via email of the ban, and threatened the youth through the BlackBerry multi-media message service (MMS) to discourage them from participating in demonstrations. The authorities also detained and intimidated hundreds of online political activists and online commentators, implemented strict filtering mechanisms to block sensitive political content from entering the Saudi internet, recruited thousands of online supporters to warn against the call for protests and demonstrations as a counter measure, and continued to apply its excessive monitoring of internet users. SAUDI ARABIA FREEDOM HOUSE Freedom on the Net 2012 2 OBSTACLES TO ACCESS Saudis first gained access to the internet in 1998. In 2011, 47.5 percent of the population had access to the internet, up from 19.5 percent in 2006, according to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).1 While in the early years, the vast majority of Saudi users accessed the internet through dial-up connections that were often slow and frustrating, less than 22.6 percent of the internet population still uses dial-up service today, with the rest using broadband connections.2 There were 11.9 million mobile broadband connections and 2.2 million fixed broadband connections in the country as of May 2012.3 Internet penetration is highest in major cities such as Riyadh and Jeddah and in the oil-rich Eastern Province. Residents of provinces like Jizan in the south and Ha’il in the north are the least likely to use the internet. The younger generations make up the majority of the user population, according to the Communications and Information Commission (CITC).4 Arabic content is widely available on the internet, as are Arabic versions of applications like chat rooms, discussion forums, and social media sites. Monthly expenditure on broadband services ranges between 42 SAR (US$11) and 334 SAR (US$89) on average,5 representing a sharp drop from the 2003 price of 700 SAR (US$187) a month.6 That said, the cost of the internet is still considered high by the vast majority of those who participated in a CITC online survey who were predominantly male (95.3 percent) and between the ages of 20 and 39 (82.7 percent).7 Connection speed for broadband varies between 724 Kbps and 1.22 Mbps, depending on the service purchased (i.e. DSL broadband or High-Speed Packet Access networks). While the majority of participants in the CITC survey were not satisfied with their connection speeds8 (possibly because of excessive filtering) and a large number of those surveyed 1 International Telecommunication Union (ITU), “Percentage of individuals using the Internet, fixed (wired) Internet subscriptions, fixed (wired)-broadband subscriptions,” 2006 & 2011, accessed July 13, 2012, http://www.itu.int/ITU- D/ICTEYE/Indicators/Indicators.aspx#. According to the latest statistics in 2012 by the Communications and Information Commission (CITC), there are 14.2 million internet users, for a penetration rate of 49.1 percent as of mid-2012. Internet Services Unit (ISU), “User’s Survey,” King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology, 2006, accessed July 17, 2012, http://www.isu.net.sa/surveys-&-statistics/new-user-survey-results.htm. 2 CITC, “ICT Indicators, Q1 – 2012.” 3 CITC, “ICT Indicators, Q1 – 2012.” 4 CITC, “The State of ICT Market Development in Saudi Arabia,” Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2010, http://www.citc.gov.sa/English/Reportsandstudies/Studies/Documents/PL-PM-015-E- The%20State%20of%20ICT%20Market%20Development%20in%20Saudi%20Arabia.pdf. 5 Ibid. 6 ISU, “User’s Survey.” 7 CITC, “The State of ICT Market Development in Saudi Arabia.” 8 Ibid. SAUDI ARABIA FREEDOM HOUSE Freedom on the Net 2012 3 planned to upgrade their internet speeds, overall infrastructure is not considered a barrier to access except in remote and sparsely populated areas. The Saudi internet is connected to the international internet through two data-services providers, the Integrated Telecom Company and Bayanat al-Oula for Network Services, up from a single gateway in years past. These providers offer service to licensed internet service providers (ISPs), which in turn sell connections to dial-up and leased-line clients. The number of ISPs in the country has risen from 23 in 2005 to 36 in 2011.9 Broadband and mobile phone services are provided by the three largest telecommunications companies in the Middle East: Saudi Telecom Company (Saudi Arabia), Etisalat (United Arab Emirates), and Zain (Kuwait). WiMAX, a technology that allows users to access the internet wirelessly from any location through a USB modem, is widely used in Saudi Arabia because it offers affordable prepaid broadband internet. Saudis access the internet from home, from their place of employment, or in internet cafes, which offer a cost-effective alternative, though the latter option has become less popular because the availability of prepaid broadband has made it easier to access the internet from home, and internet cafes do not offer secure access. Many Saudis also access the internet from their mobile telephones. While there were fewer than 20 million mobile phone subscriptions only five years ago, there were nearly 54 million at the end of 2011, representing a penetration rate of over 191 percent.10 Similarly, the average number of household mobile lines is estimated at 4.6 lines per household.11 All forms of internet and mobile phone access are available in the country, including WiMAX broadband, third-generation (3G), and fourth-generation (4G) mobile networks, internet via satellite, and High Speed Packet Access (HSPA) technologies. While smart phones like the iPhone and Galaxy tablets are banned at security organizations for fear of being targeted by hackers,12 they are available to the public at affordable prices. Service for BlackBerry hand-held mobile devices, however, was banned from August 1-10, 2010 due to concerns over BlackBerry’s encryption services,13 but the ban was lifted after the company 9 CITC, “Annual Report, 2011” [in Arabic], Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2012, http://www.citc.gov.sa/arabic/MediaCenter/Annualreport/Documents/PR_REP_007.pdf. 10 International Telecommunication Union (ITU), “Mobile-cellular telephone subscriptions,” 2011, accessed July 13, 2012, http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ICTEYE/Indicators/Indicators.aspx#. 11 CITC, “ICT Indicators 2011,” Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2011, http://www.citc.gov.sa/English/Reportsandstudies/Indicators/Indicators%20of%20Communications%20and%20Information %20Techn/2011_ICT%20Indicators%20_English.pdf. 12 “Saudi Arabia bans iPhones and Galaxy ‘tablets’ at security organizations,” Al-Arabiya, July 15, 2011, http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/07/15/157742.html. 13 “Saudi Ban on BlackBerry from Friday,” Al-Jazeera, August 4, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/08/2010844243386999.html. SAUDI ARABIA FREEDOM HOUSE Freedom on the Net 2012 4 agreed to provide the Saudi authorities with the means to access the devices’ encrypted messages.14 Major video-sharing, social-networking, and micro-blogging sites like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter are freely available, as are international blog-hosting services. However, specific pages particularly on social media sites like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter are instantly blocked if they contain sensitive political content or call for people to join political campaigns and movements. One example is the “Constitutional Monarchy” page on Facebook, which was founded on March 5, 2011 by Ali Ashmlan and presumably blocked because it called for constitutional monarchy in the Kingdom, a taboo subject in Saudi Arabia. Another example is the Facebook page, “I want my rights...I don’t want to drive,” which called for reforms in public transportation for women to use instead of driving. The page was blocked for unknown reasons, according to Maha Al-Hadlaq, one of the group’s members.15 Nevertheless, Saudis are among the largest adopters of Twitter in the Arab world, with 38 percent of all Arab tweets coming from Saudi Arabia.16 Saudis are also well-represented on Facebook, with 4.9 million users and a penetration rate of 19.1 percent as of early 2012.17 Similarly, millions of Saudis visit YouTube on a regular basis for alternative information on the country’s current affairs that differs from official media. The Internet Services Unit (ISU), a department of King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology (KACST), is responsible for managing the internet infrastructure in Saudi Arabia and reports to the Vice President for Scientific Research Support. All retail ISPs, government organizations, and universities obtain access through the ISU. Established in 1998, the ISU initially acted as a regulatory body, but governance of the Saudi internet, including licensing issues, was relegated to the CITC in 2003.