Blocking Internet during secondary school exams in Sudan: Another human rights violation

The Sudanese authorities announced that they would block access to the internet on mobile phones for three hours during the exams for obtaining the secondary school certificate this year.

The country's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority directed telecom companies to cut off the internet service during the Sudanese certificate examination sessions from 8 AM to 11 AM, starting Saturday June 11.

The move came at a request from the Ministry of Education through the Higher Committee for Securing the Secondary Certificate Examinations to prevent exam leaks and cheating.

The government had resorted to cutting off the internet service in the past two years after the emergence of widespread cases of cheating in secondary school exams by exchanging questions and answers between students through social media platforms.

The Sudanese Society for Consumer Protection criticized the Public Prosecutor's decision to block the internet. The head of the NGO, Yasir Mirghani Abdrahman, sees the decision as a violation of the law and causing heavy losses for consumers.

He commented on his Facebook page that blocking the internet is “evidence of the authorities' resorting to security options instead of technical options, and their lack of concern for consumers' rights,” explaining that the disruption of the service in all centers that host the exams requires equipment that does not cost the price of a 2020 Nissan model car.

It is worth noting that about 20 million people in Sudan subscribe to the internet through mobile networks.

When controversy raged last year over the same issue between the Ministries of Education and Interior on the one hand, which see the necessity of blocking the service, and the Ministry of Communications, which sees it as a violation of human rights, former Sudanese Minister of Interior Ezz El-Din El-Sheikh said that the secondary school certificate exams are a matter of “national security.”

Sudan is no exception in this regard. According to the Access Now organization working in digital freedoms, a number of countries have taken the same measure, such as Algeria, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq.

The organization’s experts believe that “shutdowns do not prevent cheating, as there is no evidence to suggest that these measures are effective or successful in any way. Exam leaks continue to happen in spite of shutdowns. But the negative repercussions of internet shutdowns are far reaching, and indiscriminately affect entire populations. The internet is central to many people’s daily activities — from education, business, and work, to networking, entertainment, and much more. Imposing nationwide internet shutdowns is no solution to the problem it is supposed to solve.”

The Human Rights Council, through Resolution 44/12 of 2020, had strongly condemned the use of internet blocking to “intentionally and arbitrarily prevent or disrupt access to or dissemination of information online,” and called on states to refrain from such practices.

The Sudan Examinations Administration decided last year to deprive a student of sitting for the high school exam for five years after discovering that she had communicated with a person via a mobile phone.