8/22/22, 10:18 PM Myanmar: Freedom on the Net 2019 Country Report | Freedom House Websites, Facebook accounts, and email are periodically subjected to technical attacks in Myanmar. In 2017, websites for the Ministry of Culture, the Central Bank, and Maubin University, in addition to some private webpages, were hacked and populated with messages saying “Stop Killing Muslims.” 223 The hacks were allegedly carried out by Turkish activists raising their concerns about the treatment of the Rohingya. 224 Human rights defenders, journalists, and political activists continue to report regular, often weekly, remote attempts to hack their email and Facebook accounts. 225 Digital activists in Myanmar note that Google regularly warns them of “government-backed attackers” attempting to hack their Google products. 226 Pro-Rohingya and Muslim activists are among those who report frequent hacking attempts. 227 Police use sophisticated technology to hack into the devices of journalists, including Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo in 2017. 228 Advanced spyware has been identified in Myanmar, 229 and human rights defenders, journalists, and political activists report the use of spyware installed on their mobile phones. 230 Microsoft has raised concerns once again about the large number of computers and devices in Myanmar that are infected by viruses and malware. 231 Almost 30 percent of computers in Myanmar are infected, compared to 18 percent globally. 232 Browser modifiers are twice as common in Myanmar than the global average, and software bundlers are almost three times more common. Microsoft has also raised concerns about the number of infections of the worm Win/Macoute that spreads to USB drives, which are very common in Myanmar, and communicate the drive’s content to a remote host. 233 Footnotes 1 The number of internet users was reported in 2019 a 18m by Internet World Stats, see “Internet Usage in Asia,” Internet World Stats, https://www.internetworldstats.com/stats3.htm; A report on Myanmar in 2019 by Hootsuite identified that this number had grown to 21m users by the beginning of 2019, see “Digital 2019: Myanmar,” Datareportal, accessed October 2, 2019, https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2019-myanmar. 39 percent of the population and a growth of 3m persons over the course of the year. 2 “Ooredoo Myanmar and MPT step up 4G offerings,” Developing Telecoms, June 6, 2017, https://www.developingtelecoms.com/tech/wireless-networks/7110-ooredoo-…. 3 “Myanmar to accelerate 5G development despite risks,” Eleven Media Group, December 19, 2018, https://elevenmyanmar.com/news/myanmar-to-accelerate-5g-development-des…. 4 One index rates the percentage of the population using the internet as 33.1 percent in 2019 as compared to 51.8 percent for the Asia region, see “Internet Usage in Asia,” Internet World Stats, accessed October 2, 2019, https://www.internetworldstats.com/stats3.htm; Others rate Myanmar as 39 percent, South-East Asia as 63 percent, and Asia as 52 percent, see “The Global State of Digital in 2019 Report,” Hootsuite, accessed October 2, 2019, https://hootsuite.com/pages/digital-in-2019. 5 Compared to other countries Myanmar has remained the same over the past year, see “Speedtest Global Index,” Speedtest, accessed October 2, 2019, https://www.speedtest.net/global-index/republic-of-the-union-of-myanmar. In 2017, international internet bandwidth per Internet user was 6,426 (Bit/s) compared to 48,000 for Asia Pacific, and 6,000 for LDCs, see “ICT Development Index 2017,” International Telecommunications Union, http://www.itu.int/net4/ITU-D/idi/2017/index.html#idi2017economycard-ta…. More footnotes https://freedomhouse.org/country/myanmar/freedom-net/2019 18/20