by Dr. Radut

News

AFRINIC Situation: Case narration and the way forward

On the internet, internet protocol (IP) is the most important resource used to exchange data traffic in the online world. Unfortunately, since the early age of the internet, IP address distribution has been biased. In fact, Africa got only 3% of the IPv4 numbers to serve 14% of the worldā€™s population that lives on the continent. Nowadays, even this scant allocation has been targeted to be utilised outside the region.

AFRINIC (African Network Information Centre) is the regional internet registry (RIR) for Africa. During the AFRINIC Policy Development Working Group (PDWG) session, andā€¦ Read more

A tribute to Makane Faye: Trainer, mentor, friend and colleague

The community of the African School on Internet Governance (AfriSIG) has lost a mentor and trainer following the death of faculty member Makane Faye in a road traffic accident in Senegal on Friday, 26 March 2021, while he was travelling to Dakar from the holy city of Touba.

Makaneā€™s death has left a huge void as he was a trainer par excellence and indeed a larger-than-life figure in the careers of his many fellows during his years at AfriSIG. He was a member of the Schoolā€™s faculty specialising in the theoretical and practical multistakeholder approaches to internet governance. Heā€¦ Read more

Internet governance and net neutrality

The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) defines internet governance as the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the internet.1 The internet is a network of autonomous networks of computing devices, which share the same core protocols enabling them to interoperate regardless of the endpoint applications and devices.2

Governance, most simply defined, is a form of control to ensure organisations, communities or societiesā€¦ Read more

Social media taxes and their impact on the digital economy

Negative.

Thatā€™s the ultimate effect in one word!

Social media taxes are taxes charged for the use of social media platforms. We have seen their implementation in a few African countries, including Uganda ($0.05 per day), Tanzania ($0.05) and, for a brief time, Benin. Similar taxes have also been proposed in Zambia ($0.03). The motivations behind this policy are multiple and layered; some governments are attempting to silence their opposition and those who support them, while others are using this tax as a way to make money.

What does this doā€¦ Read more

Has the four-year evolution of South Africaā€™s Cybercrimes Bill delivered the internet we want?

What is the internet we want? This was a question posed by one of the panels at the 7th African Internet Governance Forum (AfIGF), held from the 4-6 November 2018 in Khartoum, Sudan. The question is increasingly important as the development of cybercrimes and cybersecurity legislation becomes a priority for many African governments. The 2014 African Union Convention on Cyberspace Security and Protection of Personal Data or ā€œMalabo Conventionā€ represents political commitment by African states to take measures on a range of issues, including cybercrime. While ratification of the conventionā€¦ Read more

Data Protection within the Digital Age

In 2014, the African Union Commission (AUC) adopted the Malabo Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection in order to provide fundamental principles and guidelines, ensure the effective protection of personal data and create a safe digital environment for citizens as well as protect individualsā€™ online data and privacy.

However, unlike the European Unionā€™s (EU) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the African Union (AU) Convention is not automaticallyā€¦ Read more

Fake news and vague laws: Online content regulation in Africa

Africaā€™s quest to counter fake news, which could also be described as a ā€œfear of criticismā€, has become increasingly problematic in light of the recent creation of vague laws to address this challenge. The big men of Africa are absolutely terrified of criticism and now, more than ever, they are being hit with the epiphany of how powerful a weapon the internet is. Citizens no longer have to march through the streets to strike against what they deem unfair; they have a collective voice through the internet. With the current revolution taking place on Twitter, through hashtags and the like,ā€¦ Read more

Mainstreaming economics into ICT policy conversations in Africa

Something historic happened by the Nile earlier this month. From 4-6 November 2018, at Corinthia Hotel Khartoum by the banks of that gargantuan and historic river which traverses the African continent, stakeholders from across the continent and the world gathered to participate in the African Internet Governance Forum (AfIGF).

The setting of the AfIGF by the Nile was perhaps figurative. As a colleague mentioned to me, ā€˜ā€™Oh, you attended the AfIGF by that very contentious river.ā€ By that, he was referring to plans by several nations upstream the Nile to dam it, for purposesā€¦ Read more

My AfriSIG Experience and Takeaways

The sixth African School on Internet Governance (AfriSIG), organised by the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) and the African Union Commission (AUC), was attended by 35 fellows and 26 faculty members from different countries who came together for five days to brainstorm, teach, learn, network, dialogue and exchange ideas about issues related to internet governance on a global, regional and local level.

When I got the mail from the AfriSIG organisers confirming that my application was successful, I was super excited. I started packing my bag a week prior to the school.ā€¦ Read more

AfriSIG 2018: Sharing Knowledge and Building Capacity

My interest in internet governance issues was sparked when I coordinated a project on internet access for women in northern Nigeria in 2016 with the ultimate goal of bridging gender digital exclusion and promoting greater access to the use and benefits of internet to women.

Following this experience, I began to apply to participate in internet governance forum events. Initially, I had little success, but my dream eventually came to fruition in August 2018 when I received an invitation to the 2018 African School on Internet Governance (AfriSIG). When I first heard about AfriSIG, I wasā€¦ Read more

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