There was no legitimate justification under international law for the scale and nature of the military’s blocking as documented in this report. The blocking regime was therefore not a security measure, but a gross violation of international law designed to preserve a military dictatorship through the systemic closure of civic space online and the erasure of the independent media. Responsibilities of telcos Under the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, telcos have an independent responsibility to respect human rights, regardless of State pressure.11 While the military employed coercion and threats of violence, telcos operating in Myanmar were not merely passive victims. By implementing clandestine blocks that used technical anomalies rather than transparent block pages, telcos were failing their human rights due diligence. This lack of transparency prevents people from identifying and challenging censorship, effectively making these telcos complicit in the military’s regime of secrecy. To meet their international obligations, telcos choosing to operate in such environments must take all possible steps to mitigate the harm of authority directives, including providing maximum transparency to their customers and resisting the use of deceptive blocking technologies. Conclusion The military’s blocking regime has become the cornerstone for its systematic violation of the public’s digital rights, including their rights to freedom of expression, association, assembly, privacy, and participation in public affairs. It is a regime designed not only to silence the independent media but to manipulate the public into digital spaces where they can be more easily monitored and repressed. By ratcheting up the blocks of independent media during the 2025–26 elections, the military attempted to engineer a campaign period without independent scrutiny. While the blocking regime continues elections can never be free or fair, and Myanmar will remain a global landmark in digital authoritarianism. This report, the first of three, exposes one element in how Myanmar’s independent media was attacked during the elections. Subsequent reports will detail attacks on social media platforms and the resulting toll within the media outlets themselves. 11 UN OHCHR (2011), “Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights”. Page 15 of 17