This email shares OONI's monthly report for September 2023.
# OONI Monthly Report: September 2023
Throughout September 2023, the OONI team worked on the following sprints:
* Sprint 99 (1st - 10th September 2023) * Sprint 100 (11th - 24th September 2023) * Sprint 101 (25th - 30th September 2023)
Our work can be tracked through the various OONI GitHub repositories: https://github.com/ooni
Highlights are shared in this report below.
## New research collaboration
In September 2023, we formed a new research collaboration with the GLITCH Research Interest Group (https://glitch.oii.ox.ac.uk/) at the Oxford Internet Institute, a department of the University of Oxford.
This involves collaboration on the GLITCH Dashboard (on the interdisciplinary study of information controls) and the exchange of knowledge and expertise on Internet censorship.
## Published report on Grindr blocking in Jordan
In collaboration with My Kali Magazine, we published a new report on the blocking of Grindr in Jordan ("Grindr blocked in Jordan: Shrinking LGBTQ spaces").
Our report shares OONI data on the ongoing blocking of Grindr in Jordan. As of 8th August 2023, OONI data shows that access to Grindr (both the website and app) is blocked by means of TLS interference. According to Grindr, the block impacts their public health strategy as their Grindr for Equality program has played an important role in addressing the HIV epidemic in Jordan.
In preparation for the launch (October 2023), we worked on final improvements to the “News Media Scan” Android app that we have been developing in collaboration with Deutsche Welle (DW).
## Published OONI Probe user guides in Vietnamese
Thanks to Nathan Tran, the OONI Probe user guides are now available in Vietnamese!
As part of our work on creating the next generation version of OONI Run (“OONI Run v.2”), we continued working on adding UI support to OONI Probe Android for displaying OONI Run v.2 link descriptors based on the API (https://github.com/ooni/probe-android/pull/582). We also added core support for OONI Run v.2 to OONI Probe iOS (https://github.com/ooni/probe-ios/pull/533). As part of this, we added support for fetch descriptors, save/update descriptors, and for a run descriptor with existing test suites for running tests (https://github.com/ooni/probe/issues/2471).
We redesigned how OONI Probe communicates with the OONI backend and the Web Connectivity Test Helpers (THs) to increase reliability and performance. Specifically, we created a specific TLS and HTTPS network stack for performing these operations that relies on the concept of “beacons”. A beacon is a known-in-advance IP address that allows communicating with the backend or the THs and with which OONI Probe can use arbitrary SNI values. Refactoring OONI Probe CLI to add support for beacons touched upon several areas of the implementation. Roughly speaking, we can divide this work into four major activities:
1) Creating a custom TLS dialer and HTTP/HTTPS stack for communicating with backends and test helpers to avoid mixing measuring-specific and operational concerns;
2) Recognizing that the availability of a custom stack for these interactions opens up nearly for free the possibility of using HTTP/HTTPS proxies for OONI Probe;
3) Adapting the custom TLS dialer and HTTP/HTTPS stack to have a more complex notion of what it should connect to, which is more complex than just knowing domain names and the resulting IP addresses, and includes several “tactics” where each tacting may incorporate knowledge from DNS lookups, prior knowledge about well-known IP addresses, alternative SNIs to use, and knowledge about what OONI Probe knows to be working well;
4) Recognising that some properties of the new TLS dialer may, in the future, cause issues with our probe-IP-address scrubbing policy, and proactively applying changes to be sure that we are not going to include any IPv4 or IPv6 addresses and endpoints into the HTTP body and HTTP header value of submitted OONI measurements.
## Creating a Censorship Incident Reporting Platform
As part of our ongoing work on the (new) Censorship Incident Reporting Platform, we refactored the code (https://github.com/ooni/explorer/pull/862) and moved the new components to our component library (https://github.com/ooni/design-system/pull/163). We tested the latest version of the platform to identify further opportunities for improvements. We also continued to make progress on identifying censorship events (along with relevant OONI data) to be published as reports on the platform once launched.
## OONI backend
We began adding support for the compression of measurements (https://facebook.github.io/zstd/) uploaded in the API. This will significantly improve the measurement submission speed and reduce the impact of the probe on slow networks. This is especially useful for OONI Probe users running tests in environments with poor network performance.
We cleaned up a significant amount of disk space on the backend host by removing query logs. We also created a Jupyter notebook to better investigate high query load on the database. The txexitmap tool has been extended to integrate with OONI’s infrastructure (support ClickHouse, generate metrics and alerts ,etc).
We started updating the backend hosts, CI and development containers to Debian Bookworm. This is expected to provide security and performance benefits and newer libraries and tools.
### Enabling circumvention
Following the blocking of OONI in China in July 2023 (https://ooni.org/post/2023-china-blocks-ooni/), we have been working towards boosting circumvention support and making OONI Probe more resilient to blocking. As part of this process, we have been evaluating many options (each with different trade-offs).
We prepared an internal design document describing a probe bootstrap process using STUN. This will increase the reliability of the probes on highly censored networks and provide a method for circumvention.
We started deploying the forwarding of "OONI bridges" that provide circumvention in the event that OONI services are blocked by means of SNI-based or DNS-based filtering, simplifying the process of probe bootstrap and measurement submission. They also provide better reliability for the test helpers by doing active load balancing. We tested load balancing in Nginx and Haproxy and selected the latter.
## New ECH experiment contributed to OONI by CIS India
In September 2023, we continued working on creating several new video interviews with OONI community members. This involved drafting relevant interview questions, filming the interviews, and working with a videographer to edit the footage.
## Preparing for upcoming OONI trainings in the DRC and Thailand
In preparation for a week-long OONI training for human rights defenders and journalists in the DRC, we coordinated with the training organizers on creating a detailed training agenda that meets the needs of the participants. We provided live demos of the OONI tools that will be taught as part of the training, in order to enable live translation during the upcoming training programme. We also prepared and shared relevant OONI resources and reading materials for the participants.
Similarly, we also prepared a detailed training agenda, related workshop slides and hands-on exercises for our upcoming OONI training programme in Thailand.
## Planning the OONI Team Meeting 2023
In September 2023, we continued working on required logistical planning for the 2023 OONI Team Meeting and we continued to solicit team feedback for the sessions of the meeting.
## Planning the OONI Partner Gathering 2024
In September 2023, we continued to work on fundraising efforts required for hosting the next OONI Partner Gathering in May 2024.
## Rapid response efforts
### Blocking of TikTok and Google Play Store in Azerbaijan
On 19th September 2023 (amid the military offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh), TikTok users in Azerbaijan reported that they were unable to use the platform. On the same day, we reported on Twitter that the user reports were corroborated by OONI data collected from Azerbaijan, which showed that access to TikTok was blocked on at least 2 networks in the country (https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/1704160713256628716).
At the Global Gathering, we participated in the 3-day Summit (during which we collected community feedback on our upcoming Censorship Alert System) and we hosted an OONI booth for outreach purposes.
### Advocacy Assembly Internet Shutdown Mentored Training Program
On 21st September 2023, OONI’s Elizaveta hosted a session for the participants of the Advocacy Assembly Internet Shutdown Mentored Training Program (https://advocacyassembly.org/en/news/236). As part of this session, she addressed all the OONI-related questions of the training programme participants.
### FIFAfrica 2023
Between 26th September to 2nd October 2023, OONI’s Norbel and Arturo traveled to Tanzania to participate in the FIFAfrica 2023 conference (one of the largest annual digital rights conferences in Africa). Information about the conference is available here: https://internetfreedom.africa/
On 26th September 2023, we hosted the monthly OONI Community Meeting on our Slack channel (https://slack.ooni.org/), during which we discussed the following topics:
1) Updates from the OONI team 2) Discussion on recommended reading materials in the field of network measurement and how to gain deeper knowledge on the impacts of internet censorship
## Measurement coverage
In September 2023, 61,542,643 OONI Probe measurements were collected from 3,012 networks in 175 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/