(Human Rights Council 2018), which concluded that social media and Facebook had
been used to spread hate speech. The chairman of the Mission stated that social media
has “substantively contributed to the level of acrimony and dissension and conflict . . .
As far as the Myanmar situation is concerned, social media is Facebook, and Facebook
is social media” (Miles 2018). A Freedom House (2018) report also observed that antiMuslim hate speech and discrimination had been amplified by social media, as well as
some state institutions and mainstream news websites. A Reuters investigation found
“more than 1,000 examples of posts, comments and pornographic images attacking the
Rohingya and other Muslims on Facebook” (Stecklow 2018).
Free Basics is provided in participation with local mobile network providers, who
agree to waive the data charges associated with the platform. It can only be accessed in
the given countries and with a SIM card from one of the participating mobile network
providers. The providers offering Free Basics are not paid by Facebook (Eisenach 2015).
In Myanmar Free Basics was only available through a single provider—Myanma Posts
and Telecommunications (MPT). Because I don’t have information on individuals’ cell
phone or internet use, I will use cell phone coverage by MPT as a proxy for availability
of zero rated Facebook.
In a country where access to broadband internet is limited, cost of mobile data is high,
but mobile phones are common, availability to zero rated content represents a significant
availability shock on internet access. According to GSM Association (2018), in Myanmar
the cost of medium basket (mobile plan with 1 GB of data) was almost 20% of income
for lowest 40% of earners, and 8% of average income. In 2018, 79% of all internet traffic
in Myanmar was consumed by mobile phones (We Are Social, n.d.). During the past
decade, internet use has increased rapidly: from an estimated 1% of population in 2010,
to 8% in 2013, and 31% in 2017 (ITU, n.d.).
4. Description of Data
4.1. GDELT Data
I consider two different dependent variables: a binary measure of incidence of conflict
in a township, and the number of conflict events in a township, weighted by population. My main source of conflict data is the GDELT Event Database (GDELT Project
2019). GDELT is a project that uses language and data mining algorithms to monitor
print, broadcast, and web news media from across every country in the world. The algorithms are used to find geographic reference of the actors and the action. Due to the
automated collection, the GDELT database contains significantly more events than other
georeferenced conflict data.
I consider conflict events in the CAMEO event categories coerce, assault, fight, and
7