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PT community meetup December [02/12/2021]
by Vasilis 27 Nov '21

27 Nov '21

Dear all, This Thursday on 02/12/2021 December's PT community meetup will take place. Time: 9am EST / 1:00 PM UTC Where: IFF Square on IFF Mattermost More info and details on how to join: https://internetfreedomfestival.org/wiki/index.php/December_2_2021_GM Hope to see many of you there. Best, ~Vasilis -- PGP Fingerprint: 8FD5 CF5F 39FC 03EB B382 7470 5FBF 70B1 D126 0162 PGP Public Key: https://keys.openpgp.org/vks/v1/by-fingerprint/8FD5CF5F39FC03EBB38274705FBF…

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OONI Community Meeting: Tuesday, 30th November 2021
by Maria Xynou 25 Nov '21

25 Nov '21

Hello, The OONI team warmly welcomes you to join us next Tuesday for our monthly community meeting. *=> Where? *OONI Slack channel: https://slack.ooni.org/ (bridged with IRC: ircs://irc.oftc.net:6697/#ooni) *=> When?* Tuesday, *30th November 2021 at 14:00 UTC* (for 1 hour) Please add topics that you'd like to discuss during the meeting in this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/ooni-community-meeting-keep The monthly OONI community meetings aim to: * Collect community feedback on OONI tools & methodologies * Address questions in relation to the use of OONI tools and OONI data * Foster discussions on internet censorship issues * Receive updates from the community We hope you can join us! All the best, ~ OONI team

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Research paper on Internet censorship in Myanmar
by Maria Xynou 11 Nov '21

11 Nov '21

Hello, A few months ago, the OONI team collaborated with researchers at *IODA, Kentik, UC San Diego, and University of Michigan / Censored Planet* on a research paper examining censorship events in Myanmar (through diverse measurement datasets) following the military coup. The paper, titled "*A multi-perspective view of Internet censorship in Myanmar*", was published by FOCI 2021 here: https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3473604.3474562 Today, we published a blog post which *summarizes the research paper findings*, and which links to IODA's amazing YouTube video (discussing the findings): https://ooni.org/post/2021-multiperspective-view-internet-censorship-myanma… Best, Maria.

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New Report: Investigating Internet Shutdowns through Mozilla Telemetry
by Maria Xynou 09 Nov '21

09 Nov '21

Hello, In collaboration with IODA, we published a *new research report* which analyzes *Mozilla telemetry* to investigate *internet shutdowns in Myanmar, Uganda, Belarus, and Iran *over the last year. Read our research report here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-investigating-internet-shutdowns-mozilla-telemet… The folks from Mozilla also published a blog post about our report here: https://blog.mozilla.org/data/2021/11/08/detecting-internet-outages-with-mo… Below we share information about the research and some key findings. *# About the research* Given how widespread Firefox usage is worldwide, could Mozilla telemetry be a valuable resource for the Internet freedom community to investigate Internet shutdowns? To explore this question, we analyzed an aggregated dataset of network activity based on Firefox web browser usage worldwide (access to which was provided to us by Mozilla). To evaluate how useful Mozilla telemetry is for researching Internet shutdowns, we: * Selected case studies (known shutdown events from January 2020 onwards) * Analyzed Mozilla telemetry * Compared Mozilla telemetry with other public datasets We checked whether Mozilla telemetry provides signals for: * Myanmar -> Internet outages following February 2021 military coup * Uganda -> Nationwide internet outage amid 2021 elections * Belarus -> Internet outages amid 2020 elections * Iran -> Internet outages following 2020 elections *# Summary of key findings* We provide detailed analysis and findings for Myanmar, Uganda, Belarus, and Iran in our report: https://ooni.org/post/2021-investigating-internet-shutdowns-mozilla-telemet… Overall, based on our analysis for these 4 countries, we found: 1) *Mozilla telemetry provides strong signals for high impact internet shutdowns* -> When access to the internet was shut down entirely (such as in Uganda and Myanmar earlier this year), we observed a complete absence of Mozilla telemetry. This corroborates the absence of metrics that we also observe in other public datasets (such as IODA, Google traffic data, etc.) that are used to investigate internet shutdowns. 2) *Mozilla telemetry can also be used to infer lower impact internet shutdowns* -> When an internet shutdown is not "total" (when an internet shutdown doesn't impact all networks and/or regions in a country), it can still be possible to potentially infer that there is some internet disruption from the high percentage of connection timeouts and unreachable connections that are visible through Mozilla telemetry. We observed this, for example, for "lower impact" internet shutdowns in Belarus and Myanmar. Of course, it's important to cross-reference this data with other public datasets (such as IODA and Google traffic data). 3) *The geographical granularity of Mozilla telemetry provides new research opportunities* -> In Belarus, Mozilla telemetry showed a spike in connection timeouts and unreachable connections from multiple locations, suggesting that there may have been some reshaping of the network topology during the August 2020 Internet outage. 4) *Mozilla telemetry does not seem to provide signals for short-lived internet shutdowns (lasting less than 1 hour)* -> In Iran, Mozilla telemetry did not provide signals of the two short-lived internet outages that occurred on 3rd and 11th March 2020 (both of which lasted for less than an hour, and which were visible through IODA data). This is likely due to the fact that Mozilla telemetry is aggregated in hourly buckets, therefore missing short-lived internet outages. Overall, our analysis demonstrates that *Mozilla telemetry is a valuable resource for investigating Internet shutdowns worldwide*, providing novel insights through geographical data granularity. We encourage Mozilla to *publish aggregated Mozilla telemetry as open data* to support research & advocacy efforts investigating Internet shutdowns worldwide. We also share further recommendations in our report: https://ooni.org/post/2021-investigating-internet-shutdowns-mozilla-telemet… We thank Mozilla for providing us access to Mozilla telemetry for this research, and for considering our recommendations. Best, OONI team.

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Job Opening: Mobile Developer for OONI Probe
by Maria Xynou 27 Oct '21

27 Oct '21

Hello, I'm excited to share that we're hiring! The OONI team (a non-profit fighting internet censorship) is looking for a dedicated *mobile developer to work on OONI Probe*: a free software app designed to measure internet censorship and network performance. *Information about the job description, qualification requirements, and how to apply* are available here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-job-opening-ooni-mobile-developer/ This is a very exciting job opening because (if accepted) you will lead the development of the OONI Probe mobile app, supporting human rights defenders worldwide to investigate and fight internet censorship. Launched in 2017, the OONI Probe mobile app has more than 100k installs, and is run by tens of thousands of users in around 200 countries and territories every month. OONI Probe provides human rights defenders a user-friendly way to detect and collect evidence of internet censorship. This is a *full-time 12-month contract position* (which may be extended), starting ASAP. This is a *fully remote position*. We encourage applications from anywhere in the world! The application deadline is *Sunday, 31st October 2021*. Please help spread the word and help us find someone who can best serve the internet freedom community! Thank you, OONI team.

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OONI Community Meeting: Tomorrow, 26th October 2021
by Maria Xynou 25 Oct '21

25 Oct '21

Hello, The OONI team warmly welcomes you to join us tomorrow for our monthly community meeting. *=> Where? *OONI Slack channel: https://slack.ooni.org/ (bridged with IRC: ircs://irc.oftc.net:6697/#ooni) *=> When?* Tuesday, *26th October 2021 at 14:00 UTC* (for 1 hour) Please add topics that you'd like to discuss during the meeting in this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/ooni-community-meeting-keep The monthly OONI community meetings aim to: * Collect community feedback on OONI tools & methodologies * Address questions in relation to the use of OONI tools and OONI data * Foster discussions on internet censorship issues * Receive updates from the community We hope you can join us! All the best, ~ OONI team

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[Report] How Signal Private Messenger App is Blocked Around the World
by Maria Xynou 22 Oct '21

22 Oct '21

Hello, The OONI team published a new research report which shares OONI data and analysis on the *blocking of the Signal Private Messenger App in Iran, China, Cuba, and Uzbekistan*. Read the report here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-how-signal-private-messenger-blocked-around-the-… In April 2021, we released a new OONI Probe test for measuring the blocking of the Signal Private Messenger App (https://ooni.org/nettest/signal) Since then, OONI community members tested Signal worldwide every day, contributing measurements as open data: https://explorer.ooni.org/search?until=2021-10-23&since=2021-09-23&test_nam… We analyzed all Signal measurements collected from around the world *between April 2021 to September 2021*. During this period, we found that the testing of Signal primarily presented signs of blocking in Iran, China, Cuba, and Uzbekistan. *# Summary of Findings* *## Iran* In Iran, Signal was *tested on 32 AS networks*, consistently presenting signs of blocking on most networks. The block primarily appears to be performed at a DNS level by returning the IP address 10.10.34.35, which is commonly used to serve the Iranian blockpage. *## China* In China, Signal was *tested on 28 AS networks*, consistently presenting signs of blocking on most networks. Signal blocking is implemented at the DNS level, returning IP addresses inside of random IP ranges. China appears to block Signal by means of *bidirectional DNS injection*, as suggested by the fact that DNS queries from outside the country also result in injected responses, even though they target a publicly routed IP in China that does not run a DNS server. *## Cuba* In Cuba, Signal was *temporarily blocked in mid-July 2021* amid anti-government protests. OONI measurements show that the TLS handshake to the Signal backend service failed consistently with a connection_reset error, likely indicating the use of Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology targeting the SNI field of the TLS handshake. *## Uzbekistan* In Uzbekistan, the testing of Signal presented *signs of blocking on 8 AS networks*. When attempting to perform a TLS handshake to all Signal backend services, the connection constantly times out after writing the first data packet to the network. This indicates that the blocking of Signal might be implemented through the use of Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology configured to selectively drop packets. *# Circumvention* Currently, *circumvention is enabled by default* for Signal users in *Iran, Egypt, Oman, Qatar & the UAE*. In our view, this should probably be enabled for Signal users in Uzbekistan, China, and Cuba too. Signal users in other countries can: * On iOS -> Enable the “Censorship Circumvention” setting * On Android -> Use Signal TLS proxies: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360056052052-Proxy-Support You can help Android Signal users circumvent blocking (if they have a phone number which is not from Iran, Egypt, Oman, Qatar & the UAE) by: 1. Running a Signal TLS proxy: https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-TLS-Proxy 2. Sharing the mobile deep link: https://signal.tube/#<your_host_name> *# Ongoing measurement* You can also help monitor the blocking of Signal by running OONI Probe ( https://ooni.org/install/) and contributing measurements ( https://explorer.ooni.org/search?until=2021-10-23&since=2021-09-23&test_nam…) as open data. We thank OONI Probe users who contributed measurements, supporting this study. We also thank Signal for their tireless efforts in bringing end-to-end encryption to the masses worldwide. Please help share this study: https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1451482874264309763 Thanks for reading! Best, OONI team.

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OONI Monthly Report: September 2021
by Maria Xynou 14 Oct '21

14 Oct '21

Hello, Throughout September 2021, the OONI team worked on the following sprints: * Sprint 47 - Caribbean Reef Octopus (1st - 12th September 2021) * Sprint 48 - Amazon river dolphin (13th - 26th September 2021) Our work can be tracked through the various OONI GitHub repositories: https://github.com/ooni Highlights are shared in this report below. *## New OONI Probe experiment for website testing* We completed the implementation of our new Websteps experiment for measuring the blocking of websites ( https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/1733) This new experiment is the successor to our Web Connectivity network test ( https://github.com/ooni/spec/blob/master/nettests/ts-017-web-connectivity.md) The research question that this experiment tries to address is that of enumerating all the possible ways by which a specific URL can be blocked. This means that this experiment does not stop when it detects the first type of blocking, but rather drills deeper to discover all the ways by which blocking is implemented. The main differences compared to Web Connectivity that are worth highlighting include: * We use a new test helper mechanism for enumerating all the endpoints that need to be tested for a target URL. This includes all the IPs that a particular domain resolves to, as well as the full redirect chain from an uncensored vantage point. * We also use QUIC to measure websites. * We expand the taxonomy for classifying the various means by which blocking is implemented. * We add support for measuring all IP:URL pairs to detect IP blocking that only targets certain addresses. In writing this new test, we also made significant improvements to our measurement engine. In particular, we implemented several new primitives for performing the various stages of a URL request (that can eventually be reused by other tests as well): https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/pull/528. In doing so, we also documented (in our tutorial on writing OONI Probe tests, see the following section) how third parties can go about using these functions for writing their own tests. Once the improvements to the measurement engine were made, we wrote the new implementation of Websteps using these new functions: https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/pull/530 Currently, it’s only possible to run the Websteps experiment through the miniooni researcher tool (https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli#miniooni) Our next steps for rolling the experiment out in production include: * Comparing Websteps to Web Connectivity in terms of bandwidth used; * Comparing Websteps to Web Connectivity in terms of overall test runtime; * Comparing Websteps to Web Connectivity in terms of accuracy at detecting blocking events; * Deploying the new Websteps test helper in production; * Integrating the Websites experiment into the OONI Probe experimental card; * Collecting real world data and analyzing the results for accuracy; * Fully replacing the Web Connectivity test with Websteps and implementing all the needed UI changes in the user facing tools. *## Published new tutorial for writing OONI Probe tests* We published a new tutorial which explains how to write OONI Probe tests. The starting point of the tutorial is here: https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/tree/master/internal/tutorial This in-depth tutorial is meant for developers who are interested in contributing new experiments to OONI Probe. The tutorial includes multiple chapters that explain how to practically write a network measurement experiment (using the torsf experiment as an example), how to use the measurex package to write network experiments, and how to use the netxlite networking library. The tutorial includes code based on existing network measurement experiments. OONI Probe has always been free and open source to encourage independent third-party review of our methodologies. We have always hoped that the openness of OONI Probe would also encourage talented developers to contribute new experiments. Now, with the help of our new tutorial, community members can contribute their own network measurement tests. If integrated into OONI Probe, their test will be run in around 200 countries and territories every month, with test results published as open data (https://ooni.org/data/) We have already integrated the RiseupVPN test developed by the LEAP collective, and we have worked with M-Lab on integrating the NDT and DASH tests. We look forward to integrating more tests from the community! *## Published new OONI Probe CLI guide* We published a new user guide for the OONI Probe Command Line Interface (CLI): https://ooni.org/support/ooni-probe-cli Our new user guide provides step-by-step instructions on how to use OONI Probe CLI on macOS, Debian/Ubuntu Linux, and on Raspberry Pis. In particular, the user guide explains how to install and run OONI Probe CLI, enable automated testing, and view OONI Probe CLI test results. We also provide a reference for every command supported by the OONI Probe CLI. *## Published a research report on the blocking of Gutenberg site in Italy* In collaboration with Davide Brunello (independent researcher), we published a new report which examines the blocking of the Gutenberg book publishing website across networks in Italy based on OONI data. Read the report here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-italy-blocks-gutenberg-book-publishing-website/ Since May 2020, access to the Gutenberg book publishing website has been blocked in Italy (in compliance with a decree of the court of Rome) over copyright violation. OONI measurement analysis shows that access to www.gutenberg.org is blocked on at least 7 AS networks in Italy. Most ISPs primarily block access by means of DNS tampering. In blocking www.gutenberg.org, some ISPs in Italy (e.g Fastweb & Tiscali) return an NXDOMAIN, others (e.g. TIM, Telecom Italia, Iliad) return the IP address 127.0.0.1, while Vodafone Italia returns the IP address 83.224.65.170. Regardless of what is returned in the DNS response, what all ISPs in Italy (at least those included in this study) appear to have in common is the lack of transparency of the fact that access to www.gutenberg.org is intentionally blocked. Internet users just see an error message. *## Job Opening for OONI Mobile Developer* We are currently looking for a dedicated mobile developer to lead the development of the OONI Probe mobile app. In September 2021, we published the job opening, providing information about the job description, qualification requirements, and how to apply for the OONI Mobile Developer position. Our job opening is available here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-job-opening-ooni-mobile-developer/ Following the publication of this job opening, we worked on outreach efforts to help ensure that mobile developers from diverse backgrounds learn about the opportunity and feel encouraged to apply. To this end, we shared the job opening extensively on all OONI social media channels, and with relevant mailing lists and community spaces. We also posted the job opening on a number of job boards, such as FOSS Jobs ( https://www.fossjobs.net/job/10668/mobile-developer-for-ooni-probe-at-open-…) the Digital Rights Board (https://www.digitalrights.community/job-board) and Ada’s list, among others. As applications started to trickle in, we worked on organizing applications and following-up with applicants to communicate next steps. *## OONI Probe Mobile* We released OONI Probe Mobile 3.3.0 for Android ( https://github.com/ooni/probe-android/releases/tag/v3.3.0) and iOS ( https://github.com/ooni/probe-ios/releases/tag/v3.3.0) With this release, we improved the layout of the measurement screens with the goal of improving the accessibility of information. In particular, we removed the menu settings that used to exist in each test result page (to avoid nesting information too much), and we moved those settings (log, data, OONI Explorer link) to the main measurement screen of each test result. We also included a share button on the top right corner of each test result, enabling users to easily share each measurement directly with their contacts. Thanks to support from Zaina Foundation and the Localization Lab community, the latest version of the OONI Probe mobile app now supports 2 new languages: Swahili and Dutch. We also implemented a modal to ask users to update their OONI Probe mobile app to the latest version, as documented through the following ticket and pull requests: https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/1237, https://github.com/ooni/probe-android/pull/449 and https://github.com/ooni/probe-ios/pull/447. Over the last months, we had the opportunity to work with Bloco on improving the code quality and testing of the OONI Probe Android app. Bloco document their collaboration with us through their blog post: https://www.bloco.io/blog/building-test-suite-ooni-probe-android On OONI Probe Linux, we increased the frequency of automated testing to 12h. *## OONI Explorer* We added support to OONI Explorer for displaying measurements (and filtering by anomaly status) from our new Tor Snowflake experiment: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/commit/d75fa69fbcfe40ed95a240a25e6c023b83c… We also added support to the OONI Explorer search listing for filtering and displaying the anomaly status of OONI Probe Signal, Psiphon, and RiseupVPN test results: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/commit/35aac4a23b9394e205894060e2aa5b9a7b3… *## OONI Measurement Aggregation Toolkit (MAT)* We made several important improvements to the OONI Measurement Aggregation Toolkit (MAT). Specifically, we added support for ensuring that there are no holes in the charts so that multi-axis charts are properly aligned. Moreover, we added support for a custom tooltip that contains a link to the raw measurements. This work is documented through the following pull request: https://github.com/ooni/explorer/pull/600 *## Building a web platform for test list updates* We made some progress on the web platform that we’re building to enable community contributions to the Citizen Lab test lists ( https://github.com/citizenlab/test-lists) As part of these UI improvements, we added a descriptive warning when a user adds a website that is already included in test lists ( https://github.com/ooni/test-lists-ui/issues/3) and we ensured that comments are only enabled when users edit or delete entries (but not when they add new entries). *## OONI backend* In September 2021, we worked on the following OONI backend activities: * URL prioritization in the OONI API: Deployed prioritization fixes, monitored URL prioritization and created relevant internal dashboards, sorted the prioritization rules listing; * Looked into missing measurements in the jsonl table; * Added support for returning the current time as a UTC timestamp via the check-in API, which is useful for detecting when the probe system clock is out of sync; * Fixed URL prioritization further and added more end-to-end testing ( https://github.com/ooni/api/pull/264) Re-checked the test list coverage and created new internal dashboards; * URL prioritization: Debugged missing “NEWS” category prioritization rule, configured prioritization rules for Cuba and Afghanistan, added support for refraining to test “risky” category codes (see: https://github.com/ooni/backend/issues/530) * Continued to work on updating our fast-path pipeline; * Continued to monitor OONI measurement coverage from unattended runs on OONI Probe Mobile and Desktop; * Added support to the data processing pipeline for selectively reprocessing data from a specific country or of a specific experiment; * Added scoring for the Signal test to the fastpath pipeline and reprocessed OONI data; * Continued to work on updating the logic used to populate the counter tables which are used for performing aggregation queries (counters_table_updater); * Worked on deploying an upgraded version of our monitoring infrastructure. We investigated alternative database solutions that we can potentially use to boost the performance of our services and better meet our data needs. As part of this investigation, we looked into the following database solutions: * BigQuery: We dumped the fastpath in JSONL and ran benchmark queries against the whole dataset; * ScyllaDB (we had a call with them to discuss our use cases and needs); * PostgreSQL 13 (we setup a testing instance of it to test migrating our data over); * Clickhouse (we setup a testing instance of Clickhouse and ran some experiments to estimate the performance); * DuckDB: We ran benchmark queries and looked into packaging the library. We also created and plotted database-heavy queries that we can run against the database solutions that we are testing, and we looked into alternative hosting platforms. *## OONI data analysis* Leading up to Russia’s 2021 legislative election, we analyzed OONI measurements collected from Russia with the goal of understanding which platforms were already blocked in the country. Based on our analysis, we produced 2 charts on the blocking of news media and circumvention tool websites in Russia, which we shared on Twitter: https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1438913975752740866 We also shared OONI measurements which show that ISPs in Russia continued to block access to opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s website: https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1438912653607555077 *## Research reports* Throughout September 2021, we worked on 2 research reports (in addition to our report on the blocking of the Gutenberg site in Italy, which we published in September: https://ooni.org/post/2021-italy-blocks-gutenberg-book-publishing-website/) that required relevant OONI data analysis and writing. We completed these research reports by the end of September 2021, but we will publish them in October 2021, once relevant external review is complete. *## Notable community use of OONI Probe and OONI data### iThena integration of OONI Probe* In September 2021, OONI Probe was integrated into iThena ( https://root.ithena.net/) a volunteer distributed computing initiative running on the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing. This integration is documented by iThena here: https://root.ithena.net/usr/forum_thread.php?id=151 Thanks to iThena’s integration of OONI Probe, OONI measurement coverage has increased significantly! We created some charts based on OONI measurement coverage (illustrating the volume of OONI measurement coverage by platform), which clearly show the spike in coverage by iThena’s OONI Probe integration. We shared these charts on Twitter: https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1443944726235856901 *### NetDAN assistive tool* On 30th September 2021, Unwanted Witness (a digital rights organization in Uganda) launched the NetDAN assistive tool which notifies people with visual disabilities of network disruptions in Uganda based on OONI data ( https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1443560903073538053) The NetDAN assistive tool can be accessed here: https://app.netdan.org/ Alternatively, users can interact with NetDAN via phone by calling a toll-free number (+256 800 113 269). NetDAN is an assistive tool that detects and audibly informs the users about the connectivity status of the most commonly used websites and applications in Uganda, using OONI data. *### OONI data cited in Freedom on the Net 2021 reports* In September 2021, Freedom House published its annual Freedom on the Net country reports ( https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/2021/global-drive-control-big-t…) OONI data (primarily through OONI research reports) was cited in the following reports: * Freedom on the Net 2021: Uganda, https://freedomhouse.org/country/uganda/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Italy, https://freedomhouse.org/country/italy/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Myanmar, https://freedomhouse.org/country/myanmar/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Azerbaijan, https://freedomhouse.org/country/azerbaijan/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Iran, https://freedomhouse.org/country/iran/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Malaysia, https://freedomhouse.org/country/malaysia/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Saudi Arabia, https://freedomhouse.org/country/saudi-arabia/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Zambia, https://freedomhouse.org/country/zambia/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Brazil, https://freedomhouse.org/country/brazil/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Colombia, https://freedomhouse.org/country/colombia/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Jordan, https://freedomhouse.org/country/jordan/freedom-net/2021 * Freedom on the Net 2021: Ethiopia, https://freedomhouse.org/country/ethiopia/freedom-net/2021 *## Community activities### Participation in Access Now Twitter Space on internet shutdowns* On 15th September 2021, OONI’s Maria participated as a speaker in Access Now’s Twitter Space discussion titled “Global Rise of Internet Shutdowns #KeepItOn” (https://twitter.com/accessnow/status/1437893160856870915) As part of her participation in this discussion, Maria discussed how OONI tools and data can be used for measuring “partial internet shutdowns” (involving the blocking of websites and apps), as well as OONI’s role in Access Now’s #KeepItOn campaign fighting internet shutdowns worldwide. *### Participation on Kenya Internet Governance Forum (KIGF) 2021 panel* On 21st September 2021, OONI’s Maria participated as a speaker in a (pre-event) panel session on “Leveraging the Philanthropic Sector” at the Kenya Internet Governance Forum (KIGF) 2021 (organized by KICTANet). General information about KIGF 2021 is available here: https://kigf.or.ke/kenya-igf-2021/ This panel discussion highlighted the digital rights issues in the Eastern Africa region and Africa, exploring ways through which partners can leverage resources (financial, technical, networks, expertise, etc.) to better respond to threats on digital rights in the region. As part of her participation, Maria discussed OONI’s partnership program and explained how OONI collaborates with digital rights groups in Africa to measure and respond to internet censorship events. Maria also highlighted the types of resources that such groups can make use of to support their digital rights work in the region. *### OutRight Action International Webinar on launch of LGBTIQ website censorship report* On 29th September 2021, OONI’s Maria participated in OutRight Action International’s webinar ( https://twitter.com/OutRightIntl/status/1438251801212596227) to discuss the recent launch of our joint research report “No Access: LGBTIQ Website Censorship in Six Countries” ( https://ooni.org/post/2021-no-access-lgbtiq-website-censorship-six-countrie…) The webinar panelists included prominent LGBTIQ researchers and advocates from Russia and Indonesia, as well as the founder of My.Kali (an online pan-Arab LGBT magazine), who shared important insights on the impact of LGBTIQ website censorship in their regions. OONI’s Maria and the Citizen Lab’s Irene Poetranto attended to help address any questions related to our research report. The webinar recording is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W_Py9uXpz0 *### OONI Community Meeting* On 28th September 2021, we hosted the monthly OONI Community Meeting on our Slack channel (https://slack.ooni.org/) during which we discussed the following topics: 1. OONI updates: (1) Job Opening for OONI Probe Mobile Developer, (2) New User Guide for OONI Probe CLI. 2. VE sin Filtro’s public image for running OONI Probe on Raspberry Pis. 3. Measuring server side-blocking and DNS poisoning. *## Userbase* In September 2021, 16,887,184 OONI Probe measurements were collected from 4,765 AS networks in 192 countries around the world. This information can also be found through our measurement stats on OONI Explorer (see chart on “monthly coverage worldwide”): https://explorer.ooni.org/ ~ OONI team.

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Join the Community Health Village 2021
by Maria Xynou 14 Oct '21

14 Oct '21

Hi friends, Throughout November 2021, Team CommUNITY are hosting the FIRST ever *Community Health Village *for the digital rights community! This will entail a series of workshops, talks, and sessions with healthcare practitioners, healers and other experts, geared towards digital rights defenders. Sessions include "Understanding & Designing your Mental Health Plan", "Dealing with Distress in the Digital Rights Community", among many others. You can *RSVP for the Community Health sessions* here: https://www.digitalrights.community/blog/2021-community-health-village Cheers, Maria.

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OONI Monthly Report: August 2021
by Maria Xynou 12 Oct '21

12 Oct '21

Hello, These days we're primarily supported by the DRL, which is why we do quarterly reporting. That said, we'd like to share monthly updates from the OONI team with the community, hence our August 2021 report shared below. I'll follow-up to share our September 2021 report. *# OONI Monthly Report: August 2021* Throughout August 2021, the OONI team worked on the following sprints: * Sprint 45 - Antarctic Krill (2nd - 15th August 2021) * Sprint 46 - Happy Oyster (16th - 29th August 2021) Our work can be tracked through the various OONI GitHub repositories: https://github.com/ooni Highlights are shared in this report below. *## Published research report on the blocking of LGBTIQ websites in six countries* In collaboration with the Citizen Lab and OutRight Action International, we co-published a new research report, "No Access: LGBTIQ Website Censorship in Six Countries", which examines the blocking of LGBTIQ websites in Indonesia, Malaysia, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The report is available on each of our websites: * OONI: https://ooni.org/post/2021-no-access-lgbtiq-website-censorship-six-countrie… * Citizen Lab: https://citizenlab.ca/2021/08/no-access-lgbtiq-website-censorship-in-six-co… * OutRight Action International: https://outrightinternational.org/content/no-access-lgbtiq-website-censorsh… Download the full (203-page) report here: https://ooni.org/documents/2021-lgbtiq-website-censorship-report/2021-lgbti… We adopted a mixed methods research approach, combining OONI network measurement analysis with interviews and literature research. The timeframe that we selected for OONI data analysis was June 1, 2016 to July 31, 2020. To examine the impact of online LGBTIQ censorship, OutRight Action International and the Citizen Lab interviewed LGBTIQ communities in the six countries. Our research report received the following press coverage: https://www.openlynews.com/i/?id=3ff85ecb-ac2a-4a84-a451-876598f90a4f https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL8N2Q23D4 https://www.freewebturkey.com/dunyada-sansur-gundemi-28-agustos-3-eylul/ https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/tech-firms-facilitating-censorship-of… https://www.gaytimes.co.uk/life/invisible-and-silenced-lgbtq-online-content… https://76crimes.com/2021/09/15/how-online-censors-muzzle-queer-voices-in-r… *## Published research report on social media blocks amid Zambia’s 2021 election* We published a new research report titled: "Zambia: Social media blocked amid 2021 general elections". The report is available here: https://ooni.org/post/2021-zambia-social-media-blocks-amid-elections/ In the report, we share OONI data (and technical observations) on the blocking of WhatsApp, Twitter, and Facebook amid Zambia's 2021 general election. *## Academic paper on internet censorship in Myanmar published by FOCI* In collaboration with the Center for Applied Internet Data Analysis (CAIDA) of UC San Diego, Kentik, and other researchers from UC San Diego and the University of Michigan, we co-authored an academic research paper titled: “A multi-perspective view of Internet censorship in Myanmar”. We submitted this paper to the ACM SIGCOMM 2021 Workshop on Free and Open Communications on the Internet (FOCI 2021), who published our paper on 27th August 2021: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3473604.3474562 Our paper can be read through the following link: https://www.ramapad.com/papers/myanmar_foci21_cr.pdf Ramakrishna Padmanabhan (CAIDA, UC San Diego) presented the paper at the FOCI 2021 workshop ( https://conferences.sigcomm.org/sigcomm/2021/workshop-foci.html) and published a video presentation which summarizes our findings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABcswfBO2RY As part of our work on this paper, we analyzed OONI measurements collected from Myanmar between 1st February 2021 to 30th April 2021, building upon our previous research report on Myanmar ( https://ooni.org/post/2021-myanmar-internet-blocks-and-outages/) Notably, we found two cases of collateral damage caused by IP blocks in Myanmar. Based on our analysis, we contributed to the writing of the paper, and helped produce relevant charts. *## OONI blog post for TunnelBear Tales blog series* We had the opportunity to write about OONI as part of the TunnelBear Tale blog series. On 3rd August 2021, TunnelBear published our blog post (“TunnelBear tales: OONI”), which is the form of an interview. In this blog post, we discuss how OONI came to be, why people run OONI Probe, the role of network measurement in the fight for internet freedom, community stories, and what is needed to further support the censorship measurement community. Our blog post for TunnelBear is available here: https://www.tunnelbear.com/blog/tunnelbear-tales-ooni/ *## Published blog post on mining OONI data* To enable community members to access and analyze OONI data, we published a blog post which explains the various ways (S3 bucket, PostgreSQL database, OONI API, OONI Explorer) through which you can access raw OONI measurement data. This blog post (“Mining OONI data”) is available here: https://ooni.org/post/mining-ooni-data/ *## Published blog post on a brief introduction to OONI* To enable new community members to learn about OONI, we published a blog post which provides a gentle introduction to OONI, some basics about how the internet works, and how OONI Probe detects blocking. This blog post (“A brief introduction to OONI”) is available here: https://ooni.org/post/brief-introduction-to-ooni/ *## Expanding OONI censorship measurement methodologies* In August 2021, we started working on rewriting our flagship experiment (Web Connectivity) for measuring the blocking of websites. We first released the Web Connectivity test 5 years ago ( https://ooni.org/post/web-connectivity/) and it has served us quite well in measuring the blocking of websites worldwide (https://ooni.org/reports/) But internet censorship has evolved over the last years (for example, SNI based filtering is increasingly being observed), requiring us to rethink (and rewrite) how we measure the accessibility of websites. Some of the main improvements (https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/1714) we would like to make to the Web Connectivity experiment include: * QUIC support * TLS parroting * Using both the DNS of the local resolver and that of the test helper * Reducing the number of false positives by changing the logic by which measurements are run To incorporate such changes, we have decided to re-write our website measurement experiment entirely from scratch. Our new experiment is tentatively called “Websteps”, and throughout August 2021, we wrote a series of design documents to describe this new experiment. These (currently internal) design documents for our new Websteps experiment include: * High-level description of the Websteps experiment * Evaluation criteria * Underlying library: Data format and algorithms library * Prototype: Where to find a code prototype and how to use it * Data format: Specification of measurements data format * Example measurements: How measurements look like with specific errors * Known-data quality issues We started off by reviewing these documents internally in our team. Based on internal review, we made a series of iterations and improvements. The next steps of the review process involve sharing these documents with certain community members (who have relevant expertise), and eventually sharing them publicly to encourage public review and feedback. The new websteps experiment depends on the use of a new type of test-helper which assists it in performing discovery of the testing targets and is also used as a baseline for comparison. We wrote a specification for this new test helper in the ooni/spec repo: https://github.com/ooni/spec/pull/219 In August 2021, we also reviewed the pull requests by Google Summer of Code (GSoC) student Kathrin Elmenhorst, who added support for using the utls library for TLS parroting (https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/pull/442) She also worked with us on implementing a prototype for the new Websteps experiment (https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/pull/432) and fixed a bug in it (https://github.com/ooni/probe-cli/pull/447) *## OONI Probe Mobile* We worked on identifying the priorities and next steps for the development of the OONI Probe mobile app. To this end, we went through community feedback (through tickets and internal documents) to identify feature requests, bug reports, and other areas that need improvement. Based on this, we wrote an internal document where we map out the priorities and next steps for the development of OONI Probe Mobile over the next 6 months, based on which we opened relevant tickets. *## OONI Run* Based on community feedback, we worked on making some improvements to the OONI Run (https://run.ooni.io/) platform. In particular, we worked on ensuring that HTTPS is used as the default prefix when URLs are added to the platform, that the HTTPS prefix is not duplicated when URLs are pasted in bulk, and we added a note informing users that they can copy-paste multiple URLs into the platform. This work is tracked here: https://github.com/ooni/run/pull/74 *## OONI Probe Desktop* We made progress on improving the end-to-end testing of the OONI Probe Desktop app. Specifically, tests were added for ensuring that the onboarding process, the dashboard, settings, and the test results screens work as expected: https://github.com/ooni/probe-desktop/pull/243 We also worked on implementing a fix to a bug that led to the autorun settings not being preserved across updates: https://github.com/ooni/probe-desktop/pull/237 *## OONI backend* In August 2021, we worked on the following OONI backend activities: * Developed beta quality data analysis capabilities for pluggable transport tests: https://github.com/ooni/ooni.org/issues/766 * Added support to the OONI API for displaying PT measurements: https://github.com/ooni/ooni.org/issues/771 * API: Searched and fetched measurements by uid in addition to rid/input (fixes issues around paging and rid/input collision): https://github.com/ooni/api/pull/263 * Monitored the growth of unattended OONI Probe runs and test list coverage * Investigated an odd decrease in the number of received measurements from OONI Probe Android and unattended OONI Probe desktop runs, and added new metrics to our internal dashboard. * Tested the URL prioritization backend: https://github.com/ooni/backend/issues/418 * Fixed URL prioritization and added end-to-end testing: https://github.com/ooni/api/pull/264 * Added support for using the new OONI measurement data format in s3 for end-to-end testing * Created admin accounts for our test-list web UI * Prioritized the testing of the GRP Citizen Lab category code in Zambia in response to the blocking of social media (amid elections) * Looked into OONI API logs to detect popular queries that take a long time to run (heavy hitters) * Deployed Nginx caching * Worked on improvements to the system used to predict the expected measurement volume from the API * Experimented with different database indexes on our fastpath table * Worked on updating our fast-path pipeline * Worked on updating the logic used to populate the counter tables which are used for performing aggregation queries (counters_table_updater) *## Google Summer of Code (GSoC)* Throughout the summer of 2021, we had the opportunity to host two Google Summer of Code (GSoC) students: Kathrin Elmenhorst and Shivam Shekhar. Between June 2021 to August 2021, Kathrin worked with us on developing OONI Probe network experiments ( https://community.torproject.org/gsoc/ooni-probe-experiments/) while Shivam worked with us on developing integration and unit tests for the OONI Probe desktop app (https://community.torproject.org/gsoc/ooni-probe-testing/ ). In August 2021, Kathrin and Shivam completed their GSoC projects with us, and we submitted a review of their performance. Overall, we were thrilled to work with Kathrin and Shivam, and we thank them for their excellent contributions to OONI projects! *## Test list updates* In August 2021, we made a minor update to the Citizen Lab test lists for Cuba and Venezuela. In particular, we added a site (to both lists) which tracks fake news in Venezuela, but which was reportedly blocked in Cuba. Pull request: https://github.com/citizenlab/test-lists/pull/814 *## Community activities### OONI Community Meeting* On 31st August 2021, we hosted the monthly OONI Community Meeting on our Slack channel (https://slack.ooni.org/) during which we discussed the following topics: 1. Tor usage in Turkmenistan is decreasing. How can we increase OONI Probe testing of Tor in Turkmenistan? 2. Preparing for Russia’s upcoming 2021 election: Measurement and advocacy. 3. Reviewing the test list for Afghanistan in accordance with possible new regulations. *## Userbase* In August 2021, 13,304,893 OONI Probe measurements were collected from 4,938 AS networks in 194 countries around the world. This information can also be found through our measurement stats on OONI Explorer (see chart on “monthly coverage worldwide”): https://explorer.ooni.org/ ~ OONI team.

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