5/23/22, 12:53 PM Junta steps up phone, internet surveillance – with help from MPT and Mytel | Frontier Myanmar ISSUES SIGN UP NOW Youths browse Facebook at a Yangon cybercafe on December 18, 2018. (AFP) Junta steps up phone, internet surveillance – with help from MPT and Mytel JULY 5, 2021    A police cybersecurity team is working with state- and military-owned mobile operators to monitor phone users in real time, and to identify and track regime opponents online. By FRONTIER Before February 1, activist Ma Myat Su Mon didn’t give much thought to digital security. She used a SIM from military-linked mobile operator Mytel, spoke openly on phone calls and sent unencrypted messages using Facebook Messenger. Since the coup, Myat Su Mon has emerged as a protest leader in the town of Kalay in Sagaing Region, where opposition to military rule has been particularly fierce. The junta’s brutal suppression of the protests forced her into hiding, and suddenly digital security was a life-or-death matter. “I’ll never use my Mytel SIM again because I don’t trust them. I’m using Telenor and Ooredoo and I feel more secure,” she told Frontier in a recent interview, referring to Myanmar’s two foreign mobile operators. Even so, she doesn’t speak openly on the phone anymore; like many people, she suspects the authorities are monitoring her calls. When she needs to communicate with her fellow activists, she uses the encrypted messaging app Telegram, and is always careful to use a virtual private network, or VPN. “No one trusts them [the military] – we have to be very careful about our safety,” she said. “As long as we can access the internet, we don’t talk on the phone. If we need to use the phone, we use Telenor or Ooredoo SIM cards and don’t mention any places, our plans or our real names.” https://www.frontiermyanmar.net/en/junta-steps-up-phone-internet-surveillance-with-help-from-mpt-and-mytel/ 1/7