Hello? Facebook? Where are you?
In some tourist destinations, accessing our favorite social networks is not as easy as taking your mobile phone out of your pocket: censorship is more prevalent than it seems on the internet and in these countries it will not be possible for you to share the photos of your trip.
Thanks to our inseparable mobile and the quality of the internet connection, today it is possible (not to say that it is almost an obligation) share each of the details of our trips through the many and varied social networks.
Instagram, Snapchat Facebook, Twitter or even YouTube These are some of the options that Internet users have to tell, minute by minute, the details of their vacations.
However, keep in mind that not all holiday destinations entering a social network is something so simple How to take your cell phone out of your pocket.
In fact, there are a good number of countries where, for religious or political reasons, some or other social networks are blocked and it is not possible to access.
not without my facebook
You don't have to go too far to see that Internet censorship is a reality . In Russia Internet users cannot access LinkedIn , the social network for professionals.
This may not be the platform that you miss the most during your vacations, but it could be one of the social networks that you would want to use enter during a work trip.
In the case of meeting you in Russia it would not be possible: since 2016, the platform is blocked on the Russian network thanks to a law created after LinkedIn and other platforms were used by activists to organize a series of protests.
In China Meanwhile, censorship goes much further. Although the communist country a few years ago lifted the ban it imposed on Facebook back in 2009, the truth is that you can only access the social network in the Shanghai area. A movement that, without a doubt, responds to the need for both tourists and foreign investors can connect and feel at home.
However, in the rest of the country both Facebook like YouTube and Twitter do not pass the filter of the authorities and they are prohibited platforms that cannot be accessed through the internet connection.
Russia and Linkedin? Better take business cards
Unsurprisingly, the bans are even more aggressive in eastern China: in North Korea , where there are barely more than a thousand Internet connections, platforms such as Facebook or Twitter are not available for the few Internet users.
However, there is a precarious ** 3G network for tourists and authorities of the country ** in which the prohibitions are not so harsh.
In fact, some of the North Korean leaders are regulars on Facebook and Twitter despite being banned in your country, as a recent investigation revealed.
TEMPORARY BANS
Tourists not only face internet censorship in these countries where certain social networks are completely banned. In fact, it can also happen that when we arrive at our destination we find that a certain platform is temporarily blocked for a specific question.
Thus, in Bangladesh, Facebook was banned for a couple of weeks in 2010 after the social network was used by some users to share a satirical image of Muhammad, something that also happened in Pakistan and in Vietnam (although, in the latter country, the ban was due to political reasons) .
In addition, at specific times related with riots or political protests , the chances of encountering inaccessible social networks is higher: this was the case in Egypt during the Arab Spring or in Iran.
Restrictions in Egypt at times of social tension
However, internet censorship does not come only as a temporary or continuous blocking of web pages. For example, in Cuba Facebook is not blocked , but the inhabitants of the island find it practically impossible to access: the American country has made access to Facebook a 20 gig download. Getting it done with Cuba's lagging internet connection is nothing short of mission impossible.
In fact, this is a common situation in other countries. For example, YouTube is the main victim of Eritrea's antiquated technology : Low bandwidth makes Google's proprietary video platform virtually inaccessible.
However, not all censorship is due to technology, far from it. Without going any further, those from Mountain View have detected 15+ YouTube outages in 11 different regions of the world in the last decade.
Facebook in Cuba, almost an impossible mission
On other occasions, simply, some international conflict could make the traveler not find a 100% service. For example, Saudi Arabia recently ordered to Snapchat to block the channel that television has on the social network Al-Jazeera .
The solution, for all those tourists who are burning with the desire to avoid the blockade in order to share their experience in the destination country through some prohibited social network, is to resort to some tools with which it is possible to avoid government filters.
The tor network or the connections vpn they can become the perfect technological ally to swarm Facebook, Twitter and other social networks without fearing any censorship.
There is always some trick for your selfie to see the light