More than 1500 individuals—including 500 minors—were arrested since January 2021 during protest movements against the current political and economic system. Besides arbitrary arrests, police also confiscated protestors’ telephones and breached their personal data.
Harassment, revenge porn, blackmail: 80 percent of women in Tunisia have experienced violence on the internet. This violence is multifaceted and rampant on social media. In an effort to stop it, some have decided to publicly denounce their aggressors on Facebook through the Ena Zeda groups. But is this enough to stem the violence?
« Disinformation as a service » is how the Atlantic Council described the services provided by Tunisian digital communication agency UReputation to presidential candidate Nabil Karoui during his campaign for Tunisia’s 2019 presidential elections. On June 5, the American think-tank published an investigation carried out by its Digital Forensic Research lab (DFRLab) which exposed the collaboration. Dubbed « Operation Carthage », UReputation’s activities targeted 10 African countries to the profit of four politicians running for president in their countries’ elections. Yet another affair revealing Karoui’s dubious practices, who owns UReputation, the Tunisian PR firm with such global influence?
Since the Russian interference with the 2016 US presidential elections, there have been numerous conversations, strategy building and commitments on a global scale involving policy makers, civil society and leading tech companies like Facebook to fight disinformation. In the era of “troll armies” and “fake news”, we are witnessing more and more the power of clandestine influence campaigns on social media to fuel divisions, disfigure the public spaces and influence voters. Tunisia is not exempted.
“Winou el pétrole?”—Where is the oil? began to draw the attention of the media since the end of May when citizens hit the street with signs, and has gained considerable visibility since last week when demonstrations in the capital and the south of the country turned into violent confrontations between protesters and security forces. Furthermore, doubts regarding the movement’s beginning as a spontaneous social media campaign and uncertainty about the authenticity of its objectives have stirred controversy and warranted the response of the political figure and government officials.
Amidst the distilled information and tones of alarmism and pessimism that stifle quality discussions on terrorism in mainstream media, one finds the insight and information provided by members of civil society, activists, government officials active on social media platforms. Such a plurality of perspectives is important for fleshing out and expanding a discussion that is commonly portrayed as a two-sided debate between human rights advocates who demand the protection of civil liberties at the expense of effective security measures, and conservative political figures whose rhetoric of national security and unity in the face of terrorism is construed to harbor power and by extension repress fundamental rights.
“In a single day, Tunisia’s military court imposed prison sentences on a union leader and a blogger for speech offenses, even though neither was present for his trial,” said Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “This is not worthy of the new Tunisia.”
n their presidential electoral campaigns, both candidates used the same communication vehicles including public speeches, in-field visits with different number and destinations of visits, press conferences and TV interviews. The slogan of the electoral presidential campaign of both candidates focuses on the word “Tunisia.”
Up until now, the debate surrounding the role of Twitter and so-called Web 2.0 has remained somewhat polarised. This report then aims to provide an empirical analysis of the available data in order to move away from the binary arguments presented by those who have come to be known as “cyberoptimists” and “cyberskeptics”.
On July, 2 more than 300 bloggers, netizens, and academics flocked to Westlands in Nairobi, Kenya to take part at the 2012 Global Voices Citizen Media Summit. After welcoming guests, Ethan Zuckerman, co-founder of Global Voices Online gave some historical background, and talke about the first Global Voices Summit.
Al Jazeera speaks to Sami Ben Gharbia, a Tunisian activist who co-founded the popular web portal Nawaat.
25 January 2011 was the day when people of Egypt went to the streets in several cities to demonstrate against […]
A few weeks ago, the New York Times published an op-ed by respected journalist Rami Khoury, entitled “When Arabs Tweet.” […]
Khaled Said is not the first Egyptian whom police allegedly beat to death. But his death has sparked a virtual […]
Residents and farmers rally in front of the regional government house in Sidi Bouzid. A group of Tunisian farmers is […]
From 25-30 April, IPI Press Freedom Manager Anthony Mills participated in a joint press freedom mission to Tunisia, along with other representatives of the ‘Tunisia Monitoring Group (TMG)’, which brings together over twenty organisations from the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) network.
Far from being exaggerated, the Tunisian anti-censorhip movement is one of the best innovative in the world and has been adopting creative approaches and tactics from its early beginning to its current stage.
Tunisian activists geared up to organize a peaceful demonstration against censorship as part of the May 22 worldwide event announced […]
This search is powered By Nawaat experimental generative artificial intelligence. Begin typing your search or question above then press return. Press Esc to cancel.
