A whole new generation of digital rights activists rose after the coup, a dramatic event that prompted people to undergo crash courses in online safety. There was a 7,200% increase in the use of virtual private networks (VPNs).[2] “We have been banned from accessing most social media sites. That’s why we have to use a VPN to circumvent the blacklist," explains an informant engaged in the PDF. NordVPN stated that its company received more than 10,000 requests from Myanmar for its Emergency VPN program which provides free premium access to its service "in extreme cases of censorship or online privacy violations". Other organizations such as The Tunnel Bear and Mysterium Network rushed in to circumvent the blackout in Myanmar. This was reminiscent of the pre-2011 situation when the few people who were able to browse the Internet used proxies to access websites that were banned by the government. In the first 48 hours following the coup, some 1.4 million people across Myanmar downloaded the application Bridgefy, which allows users to send offline messages to others within a range of a few hundred meters through Bluetooth or Wi-Fi antennas. In a year, it became the favorite “protest app,” from Hong Kong to Turkey and Black Lives Matter gatherings. It was quickly abandoned in Myanmar as the streets became too dangerous for large protests, and networks of activists are now scattered around the country, with some of them forced to be completely off-radar. As of September 27th, Internet access in 25 towns and cities across five states of Myanmar was cut off. According to Htaike Htaike Aung, Internet Freedom activist working on Digital security and Public Policy: "This pattern of shutdown is concerning as it is happening particularly in areas with violent crackdowns by the military junta." Such targeted blackouts are not new, as explained by Htaike Htaike Aung in a talk on Myanmar’s Digital Revolution: “During the Saffron revolution in 2007, a handful of bloggers and cyber-dissidents managed to access the Internet and worked hard to bring news of what was happening to the world. There were very few people and businesses online but after the crackdown, the very nascent Myanmar Internet was cut off for a few weeks, which was I believe one of the first politically motivated Internet shutdowns in the world.” In June 2019, at the military’s request, the Ministry of Transportation and Communication, citing security concerns and public interest, ordered telecom companies to shut down Internet and data traffic services and to (re)start filtering websites. Nine townships in Rakhine and Chin states were affected by the order, after clashes between the Burmese Army and the Arakan Army (AA), anywhere from four months to more than a year. The February 1st coup brought to Yangon, Mandalay, and the rest of the Bamar plains the experience of imposed telecommunications cuts for the first time. In early March, electricity was cut off nationwide from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. On March 17th, the Internet was shut off in Hlaing Thar Yar, the same day the SAC regime gunned down more than a hundred protesters in the Yangon working-class industrial neighborhood. Since early October, numerous townships of Northern Shan, Chin, Kachin and Kayah states as well as in Sagaing and Magway 5