should be noted, however, that these events happened under the old government ruling and before Abiy took office in 2018. The state of emergency of February 2018 had also been imposed by the old government, and Abiy, as part of his political reforms, brought the state of emergency to an end earlier than legally necessary (Dahir, 2018b). A 2014 report by the Human Rights Watch details how the Ethiopian government has controlled the media landscape. Information from sources that were independent from staterun media had become increasingly difficult to access, and journalists were facing a choice of self-censorship, arrest or exile. Human Rights Watch has gone further, reporting that diaspora journalism has been targeted, in particular television. For instance, the Ethiopian Satellite Television and the Oromia Media Network (OMN) stations were banned under the country’s anti-terrorism law (Human Rights Watch, 2014). The government of Prime Minister Abiy has been taking steps to increase press freedom since 2018. Networks such as OMN are now active again. Additionally, arrested journalists have been released, and the government held a World Press Freedom Day in May 2019. However, these developments have been overshadowed by new arrests (Freedom House, 2019a). Thus, it remains unclear whether events such as the World Press Freedom Day and the release of journalists have in fact been intended to temporarily appease public opinion. Table 1: Organizational Form and Prevalence of Social Media Manipulation in Ethiopia Initial Government Politicians Private Contractors Civil Society Citizens & Report Agencies & Parties Organizations Influencers X EPRDF X Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Blank spaces indicate no evidence was found. Strategies, Tools, and Techniques In 2016, the government shut down mobile networks for almost two months, thereby controlling spread of information digitally, and removed space for critical voices through punishing critical opinions, which was exacerbated by the conduct of arrests without court orders. According to government figures, over 10,000 citizens were detained. Access to social media and websites containing information deemed subversive was heavily restricted. In December 2017, amid anti-government protests, the government started blocking internet and social media access again, though access to many pages have since been reestablished (Freedom House, 2019a; Freedom House, 2019b). Still, internet shutdowns take place frequently; for instance, in June 2017, during the national exams period, the Internet was shut down across the nation and between May 30 and June 8, all telecom networks were shut down following the conviction of two human rights activists for online expression in May 2017. In June 2016, the Computer Crime Proclamation was passed, criminalizing amongst others digital content that “incites fear, violence, chaos or conflict among people” and legitimizing interception of digital communications (Freedom House, 2018; Freedom House, 2019b). Freedom House reports on a lack of transparency about how such control is operationalized, exacerbated by the fact that the government denies it censors the Internet (Freedom House, 2019b). Additionally, Freedom House continues to highlight persecution cases for online activities in which activists were imprisoned without being charged or in some cases tortured. There has also been evidence that governmental agents have taken over accounts from activists that have been imprisoned, such as Yonatan Tesfaye, 136